Affinitive Academy: Beginnings
by Fallen Lightning
Summary: The idea of a formal education didn't appeal to Eren Fenrir, but acceptance into a Pokemon academy provided him with opportunities he wasn't expecting. As well as making friends and rivals, Eren discovers that not everyone's intentions are as pure as his and he finds himself thrown into the middle of a sordid scheme involving men in white and abnormal pokemon. SYOC open.
1. Chapter 1

**Hey there readers and fellow authors! I'm FallenLightning and this story is a reboot of a story from my old account. I wasn't satisfied with how I progressed with the chapters, so I decided to remake it, on this account. I'm an improving writer and I draw inspiration and ideas from many different sources. This is an SYOC story and the submission form is given at the bottom of this chapter. If you are interested, feel free to submit a character.**

 **Disclaimer: only saying this for the first and last time, I don't own pokemon, only the plot and some of the characters.**

* * *

 **First Impressions**

The clamor of the unorganized crowd of students reached his ears through the open window. They seemed to be enjoying their time with each other. Howls of laughter and yelling across the campus grounds were the most prominent. He wanted to be out there too, getting a charge out of meeting new people and making new friends.

He sighed.

"Mr. Fenrir, mind that I'm also talking to you," an authoritative voice admonished him.

He stiffened at the tone of the voice and cautiously turned to look at the person. His dark blue gaze was met by a stern hazel, and an amused smile.

"Yes, but like I said, I'm not at fault here Mrs. Autumns."

"That's for me to decide," the woman replied.

She was dressed in a sharp pantsuit and a white blouse, and sat behind a pristine wooden desk loaded with stacks of papers. Picture frames hung off the walls, which were covered in a beautiful wallpaper. He had barely discerned that the principal was present in nearly every picture on the wall.

He turned his gaze to his right, where a tall boy stood. His eyes weren't visible from the side, hidden by black bangs, but since he had seen them before he knew that they were dark green.

He mentally groaned. ' _Why me dammit?'_

* * *

An hour ago

* * *

 _If you are reading this letter then that means you have been accepted, and are headed towards Quake Island, where our school, the Affinitive Academy is present. The academy will be a home to you for the coming three years, where you will learn many things relating to what aspirations you have. Many of the world's gym leaders, researchers, rangers and elite trainers have graduated from the Affinitive Academy. Everything you will need to know about your new school will be explained at the orientation which you will be attending shortly after you reach the campus. We shall meet you soon!_

Clara Autumns, (Principal)

Eren sighed in frustration as he put the letter back on his lap. An academy. Of all the places and other schools, his old man sends him to a prestigious one. And his mom even agreed to it.

"Damn you pops," Eren muttered under his breath.

"It's not every day you see a student not excited to attend a prestigious academy."

Eren lazily turned his head to his right to the girl sitting next to him. Her smooth chocolate brown hair, a few shades lighter than his own, flew over her face under the light breeze coming through the open bus window. It was mostly straight but ended in small curves directed inwards, just past her shoulders. Her hair matched her angular face with near perfection, and her dark but enthusiastic green eyes didn't disappoint either. In short, she was very attractive. But Keith wouldn't say that to her face, nope. He didn't want to give his best friend the pleasure of a compliment on her looks.

"I might just be the only student," he said.

Studying wasn't the most appealing thing to him. It was a world of complete boredom, aside from any cool science lab experiments which caused explosions. Now _that_ was cool.

He absentmindedly rapped his knuckles on the window that was rolled down halfway.

"Say, Reyna, what kind of a place is Quake Island anyway?"

Reyna put a finger on her chin.

"As far as I remember reading, it's a pretty big island, big enough to hold the entire campus along with a couple of stadiums and training grounds, a daycare and even some shops. That's all I know, but there's probably a lot more.

Eren whistled. "Damn that's pretty cool honestly."

Hearing the word 'daycare' reminded him of the daycare that Reyna's family ran. Both of them hailed from Kanto, Viridian City. Viridian city was a good place to keep a daycare running. Trainers from the Indigo Plateau as well as beginning and intermediate trainers would have to pass through Viridian at some point in their journey.

Eren had pretty much grown up in the daycare, spending hours each day surrounded by many different pokemon. He played with them, fed them, pit battles between them, and had slept with them on some occasions after a day of intense fun. It was like an everyday routine.

The bus suddenly jerked to a halt and Eren was launched face first into the seat in front of him. "Ow! Shit!" he cursed, a hand on his nose.

Reyna only snickered as she got up and grabbed her backpack. "Looks like we're here," she said, pushing a lock of hair behind her ear. The other students on the bus started to get up and grab their smaller luggage. Everyone had been told that their larger luggage would be directly delivered to their respective dorms where they could pick it up.

The doors opened and one by one the students began to step down. Eren was just about to go behind when he saw a blond haired girl struggling to get her luggage down. She had a small frame, pretty small compared to his 5'10" frame. Some of the students in the back were getting a little impatient, Eren could tell from their annoyed glares.

He stepped forward and pulled her bag down for her. The girl looked up to him with a smile.

"Thanks for that," she said.

Eren smiled back. "Don't mention it."

They moved forward and he jumped down from the bus. He looked around.

"I thought you said we were here Reyna."

Through the plethora of students, Eren could see the school authorities trying to conduct the students into two different sides of the road. Standing apart from the horde of students were a few men in fluorescent jackets with walkie-talkies in their hands, stationed around the periphery of the road, possibly to make sure no one strays from the direction.

"Well we're on the coast of the mainland, we have to cross this water," she made a gesture towards their left," And then we'll reach the island."

Eren hadn't noticed the expanse of water before, and now that he looked over it, he saw that it was considerably large, in fact, he couldn't even see the island.

"Soooo, we're going by boat?" he asked.

Eren and Reyna were ushered forward by some authorities, and they found themselves amidst the students on the right side. The pavement on the right side was further extended and was divided into parts opposite to each other, both with steps leading down.

Reyna decided to answer his question at the moment they headed down the steps on the right.

"There are three ways to get to Quake Island, the ferry, the normal overhead bridge and then the underground tunnel," she pointed to the nearing entrance to something that looked identical to a cave, which had dim lights on its border. It was huge, seemingly twenty feet in height and about seventy feet wide.

"And we're headed through the underground tunnel,"Eren finished as they walked through the entrance. He gazed around in awe. The inside was grand to say the least. It was a complete arc of marble, with golden streaks running all around. Half of the floor was a flat escalator which was again divided in half with the belts moving in two different directions, while the other half was a normal walkway, and they were both separated by metal railings. It was so simple yet so satisfactory.

"This is so pretty," Reyna whispered as she walked beside him, both of them taking the normal walkway instead of the moving one. Eren only nodded. Out of the corner of his eye he saw a few guys ogling at Reyna. He felt a flicker of irritation but then sighed. This was pretty normal. She obviously had looks but Eren was the only one who knew she had brains too.

Reyna had a really brilliant mind and was often praised for it. She was feisty and independent and kind at the same time. And then there was him, like some kind of half-assed sidekick.

It wasn't long before they reached the end of the tunnel, or maybe it didn't feel like a long time because of their brisk pace.

Eren squinted as the sun's rays fell on his eyes. It was only around five in the afternoon but the sunlight was harsh. When his eyes adjusted to the brightness, he was quite amazed by what he saw. The students had seemingly tripled in number, chatting in groups and pairs. He assumed that second and third year students were also mingled within the first years. The next thing that amazed him was the infrastructure. Without a doubt, this was probably just a fraction of it, but nonetheless this was enough to impress him.

Palm trees were lined up next to each other with equal distances between them. They were real, but something told him that it wasn't always tropical weather that passed over the island. Grass was present wherever there was no pavement. In the distance he could see what was most probably the stadium and even further than that, three buildings which were blue, red and green respectively in color.

"Those are the student dorms Aqua, Ignis and Herba. Each dorm has first, second and third years in it. But each room only has students of the same year," Reyna said dryly.

"No co-ed rooms?" Eren asked with a hopeful face. Reyna lightly knocked him on the head.

"No, is that all you think of?"

Eren sulked, and then straightened up. "Of course not, I think about food too. How's the food here?"

"Better than anything you can make," came the reply.

Eren placed a hand over his heart. "Ouch. That hurts."

Reyna stuck her tongue out at him. Suddenly, a voice rang out over the area. "Second and third year students please proceed to your respective dorms, first year students are requested to hear towards the main stadium."

In a matter of moments students were running all around the place. There was a lot of pushing and shoving and Eren was rocked back and forth. Amidst the disorder he was separated from Reyna.

"Eren! Eren!"her calls were lost over the commotion that the students had created.

Eren found himself surrounded by strangers and he had to squeeze through the tiny gaps to get away.

He felt something hit his chest hard and he looked down just in time to see a girl falling. He swiftly reached out and grabbed her arm with his left hand and waist with his right.

"Are you okay? Sorry about that," he said as he brought her back up to an upright position.

The girl blinked as if trying to understand what had just happened. She looked up and smiled, rubbing her head sheepishly with a hand.

"Ah it's my fault I wasn't looking around," she apologized. Eren shook his head.

"Nah it's my fault. You're not hurt are you? And sorry for suddenly grabbing your waist like that."

The girl laughed, her blond chest length hair moving up and down.

"I'm okay thanks to you, if you hadn't grabbed me I'm sure I would've been in the ground, probably run over by these people, so no worries. Now that I remember, this is the second time you've helped me today, so thanks."

Eren slowly realized that she was the same girl whom he had helped on the bus.

He grinned. "Don't mention it."

He quickly inspected her, doing so without making it look like he was checking her out or staring. She was quite fashionable, for a student at least. She wore a light pink pleated skirt and a white blouse. She also wore flats instead of shoes.

The girl dusted herself even though she hadn't fallen, and held out her hand.

"I'm Adelaide Roe. Nice to meet you!"

Eren reached out and shook her hand. "Eren Fenrir, first class helper at your service."

Adelaide laughed.

"Are you a first year too?" he asked.

Adelaide nodded. "I was just headed towards the stadium when this happened." She gestured to the now dwindling number of people around. The first years seemed to be the only ones left.

"If you don't mind, let's go together," Eren suggested.

"Sure!"

The two of them started walking in the direction of the stadium.

Eren decided to make some small talk.

"So how did you end up coming here?" he asked.

"Actually, I was invited here by the academy itself. They offered me a scholarship saying that it was because I was a trainer who had defeated all the gyms in Kalos and even flight the elite four and champion, even though I lost."

Eren's eyes widened. "Wow no kidding? You must be one hell of a trainer then."

' _If these people get accepted, it's because they deserve it. Dammit pops you're making me feel inferior here._ '

Adelaide gave an embarrassed smile.

"Ahaha thanks. I'm not all that great though."

"Say, did you have some kind of disease or ailment?"

Her head whipped up to look at him, a shocked expression on her face.

"How did you know?" she asked.

"I wouldn't call it a guess or a deduction. I just noticed that you're breathing differently, like with short rapid breaths," He replied.

"Well aren't you Mr. Observant." She grinned. "I was diagnosed four years back with a disease that severely affected my lungs. I was told that the odds of surviving weren't really in my favor. Guess I proved them wrong." She finished with a wink.

Eren was amazed by the way she has stated everything so nonchalantly.

"I don't even know what to say to that, you're really gutsy aren't you. All hail the will of Adelaide Roe." Eren made a bowing gesture with his hands.

Adelaide only giggled.

"You're so sweet, thank you. Did you come here alone?"

Eren froze. Due to everything that just happened, he had forgotten about Reyna.

" Now that you mention it I was with my best friend. I forgot about her for a minute there."

"Yeah she's right here dumbass," Rena said from behind him. She had an annoyed look on her face.

"Uh hey, what's up?" he said nervously.

Reyna flicked his forehead in response. "How nice of you to forget your best friend," she remarked sarcastically.

"Hi there, I'm Adelaide Roe!"

Adelaide introduced herself enthusiastically to Reyna. Reyna shifted her attention to the blond girl. With a smile on her face she returned the greeting.

"Nice to meet you, I'm Reyna Ivy. I hope my friend didn't cause you any trouble."

"Oooh, the demon smiled," Eren whispered quietly.

"I heard that." Reyna kicked him in the shin and he had to bite his lip from swearing out loud.

Adelaide shook her head. "Not at all. In fact, he helped me twice."

"Huh, so you did something good for once in your life," Reyna taunted.

Eren scowled. "I've done a lot of good things for your kind information."

Adelaide laughed. "There's no doubt about it, you guys are definitely best friends. And Reyna I really like your casual dressing sense."

Reyna looked surprised that someone had mentioned her attire being good. After all, she was dressed in some fitting grey sweatpants, white sneakers and a light pink t-shirt.

"That's so nice of you, thanks," Reyna said with a big smile on her face.

"So I assume we've made our first friend already?" Eren said, hands in the pocket of his jeans.

"And I've made my first _two_ friends."

Eren and Adelaide exchanged a high five and both of them chuckled alongside Reyna.

Abruptly, out of nowhere something hit Eren on his shoulder with considerable force and he was thrown to the ground. As fast as he could, he planted his right hand in the ground and rolled over on his right shoulder. Since the fall had been so sudden he couldn't balance the roll and landed on his side. He coughed as dirt was flung onto his face and a rock nicked his cheek.

' _What the hell is up with me crashing or something crashing into me today_ ' he thought. He slowly sat up, shaking his head to get rid of the dirt.

"What the hell was that?" he said.

A tall boy stood where he had been standing before and he stared down at Eren through dark green eyes, which were barely visible through his black bangs.

"Ah. Oops." was all he said and he started to jog.

Adelaide, Reyna and Eren only stared as the boy only moved about a meter before turning back and glaring at Eren.

"Battle me."

Eren blinked in confusion. "Huh?" was so he could muster up at the sudden request, or what sounded like an order.

The boy was wearing a hoodie even though there was only a light breeze. He pulled a pokeball from his belt.

"I said, battle me. Or are you too scared?"

Eren stood up. "Nice try, that won't work though. You know we can't exactly battle here right? Not to mention, it didn't look like we can battle at all anywhere besides the grounds. And I don't feel like battling right now, so maybe next time." He dismissed the appeal and walked towards where the girls stood.

Suddenly their eyes widened and they shouted out, "Look out!"

Eren had just barely moved his face an inch,when a jagged bolt of lightning passed by his face and struck the ground to his side. The small area was left sizzling. He involuntarily shuddered.

"What was that for? That could've hurt him!" Reyna yelled at the boy.

Eren looked at the boy. His pokeball was still in his hand, but there was a pokemon crouching in front of him, the source of the attack. It was a quadruped pokemon which was mainly blue in color but had a spiky yellow mane. A manectric.

"Aiz, thunderbolt again," the boy commanded.

Eren jumped aside as another bolt flew by.

"Hey hey buddy, what's your problem?" He growled.

He sidestepped, dodging another bolt.

"Stop it, what are you doing that for!" Adelaide exclaimed.

The boy glared at Adelaide with an irritated look on his face.

"Aiz, thunderbolt on her."

Without any hesitation, the manectric fired the attack towards the girls.

Realizing he had no option, Eren tossed a pokeball from his belt in desperation.

"Quick, Delta! Use rock tomb to deflect it!"

A bipedal pokemon with large wings emerged from the pokeball and darted towards were the girls were. It roared, and chunks of rocks were pulled up from the ground, effectively deflecting the lightning bolt. But the attack was powerful and one of the large rocks was also deflected, and it crashed into a small fountain, fortunately not breaking it, but causing damage nonetheless.

Eren's aerodactyl Delta flapped its wings as it stood protectively in front of Adelaide and Reyna. Eren sighed in relief. Good thing they weren't harmed. He noticed that all the nearby students were gawking at the sight in front of them, whispering amongst themselves.

He glowered at the boy. "The hell? That was uncalled for, it could have hurt them!" he shouted.

The boy seemed unaffected by what he had done.

"Well at least that got you to call out your pokemon. Alright, let's do this." He took a stance.

' _This guy has problems_ '

Eren was about to tell him off again when the crowd parted and a man came running through. He looked much older than anyone present on the scene.

He looked at both pokemon and then their trainers with an astringent look on his face.

"What do you think you're doing," he asked in a low tone.

"Well you see-" Eren started, but was interrupted by the man, most likely an authority on the island or perhaps even a teacher, stuck up a finger to stop him.

"Save your words for later, because I'm taking you both to the principal _right now_."

"But it's not his fault!" Adelaide said in Eren's defense.

"You stay out of this young lady. I believe what I see, and that's adept right now." He gestured at his back with his thumb.

"Put those pokemon back and follow me, no objections kid," he said, this time to the other boy.

"Tch."

The boy recalled his manectric and Eren reluctantly did so with Delta.

He shot a glance at Reyna which said, 'I'll take care of this, you go on.'

Reyna looked concerned but she nudged Adelaide, who mouthed a 'good luck', and they started walking towards the stadium again.

The man then addressed the other students.

"What are you all looking at? Go, shoo! Head to the stadium."

The students dispersed, whispering and casting glances at the two boys who had caused a scene.

Eren trudged behind the man add they headed to the principal's office, the taller boy following silently.

Eren shook his head and sighed.

' _There goes that valuable first impression._ '

* * *

 **And that's the first chapter! Not too long I know, but as soon as characters pile up, more things will happen, so be on the lookout.**

 **Here's the character submission form:**

Name:

Age: 16-18 (for anything other than a student you can choose whatever age)

Gender:

Birthday:

Region:

Role: (what kind of a role does your character play? Friend, supporter, antagonist, evil, etc.)

Occupation: student, teacher, researcher, etc.

Physical Features: Give me a detailed description of how your character looks, from head to toe. What kind of build do they have? Facial structure? Any marks or scars? Eyes and hair? Don't make them too buff, they're a damn high school student. I need EVERYTHING. The more the better

Clothing: what kind of clothes does your character wear normally? On occasions? Winters? At night? On a trip? To the beach? Etc.

Personality: This is very important. This defines who your character is. Please be more original and put some thought into this. I want unique personalities. Not the common badass or loner, make your own twists. How does your character behave around people they know? New people? What kind of a temperament do they have? Write everything you can about interaction and feelings. What are their relationships with their family and friends? DETAILED description. The more the better.

Relationship: (do you want them to be in a relationship? Yes or no? What do they look for in a crush or someone they love? What is their relation with their family? Do this part carefully, it can affect the story to a certain extent

Backstory/Past: another important part. How did your character end up in the academy? What kind of a childhood did they have? Any traumatic incidents? Fears? DETAILED please

Likes: What do they like?

Dislikes: What things do they dislike?

Skills/Talents: what are they good at?

Hobbies and interests: what do they like to do in their free time? What fascinates them?

Preferred course: Battle, Coordinator, Ranger, Researcher, Breeder

Battle style: a small description works, but remember, make it unique.

 **POKEMON:**

Now this is where there are a lot of problems. There are many common pokemon that are overused. Those are:

Lucario and Rioulu

The entire Ralts line

Eevee and eeveelutions (you can select one, but it's better if you don't)

Starters (keep them to a minimum, one per person)

So I've seen many other writers use this method and I think it's pretty good. So every person get 15 points as of the start. The stage of the pokemon signifes it's points. For example charmander is a stage 1 so it uses up 1 point, whereas charmeleon would use up 2 points. Think rationally and build a nice team. NO legendaries, NO ultra beasts, NO alolan pokemon right now, though I might make them available in the future. One pseudo legendary limited to each person. It's unlikely for a first year to have a pseudo legendary, so make sure to have one if you are a third year student. And don't make your team overpowered. I will instantly decline it.

Pokemon name/species:

Nickname:

Gender:

Ability: no hidden abilites

Personality: don't make this too big

Backstory/past:

Level: for evolution purposes (if you don't want the pokemon to evolve, mention it)

Moves: I'll go with the standard moveset, but include any specific moves you'd like

OTHER: In case I missed anything about the character mention it here.

If your character seems too common I will decline or ask you to change it to satisfactory.

 **Adelaide Roe belongs to SomeoftheFame while all the other characters belong to me. More characters will be introduced next chapter, so stay tuned. Drop a review if you liked it, no flames, don't need those.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Sorry for being so late on this chapter, I was a little busy with quite a bit of stuff.**

 **I'd like to thank everyone who submitted a character, and everyone who reviewed! Thanks to some constructive criticism I got to know of all the mistakes I made in the first chapter. Constructive criticism is welcome, because I need to improve with every chapter.**

 **And so here's chapter 2!**

 **AN:** ' _this_ ' is Eren thinking

* * *

The principal's office was in another building, much shorter in height than the dorms but considerably wide. It was a part of the main student office, the headquarters of the school, or at least that's what the sign outside the building said. Eren walked behind the man who had arrived on the scene a few minutes ago to prevent a fight between him and the tall boy, who was silently walking alongside him.

The boy walked with his gaze fixed on the ground, his face was expressionless and Eren couldn't tell what he was thinking. He didn't seem scared or nervous about meeting the principal less than a day into the school year. Not that Eren was nervous, he had no reason to be.

' _Huh, maybe this isn't the first time she's done something like this_." Eren mused.

The boy had certainly surprised Eren, asking for a battle and then going as far as to attack his friends just to make him call out his pokemon. He seemed restless and aggressive. Eren hated to admit it, but he was a bit judgmental of people at first glance. So to Eren the dark haired boy seemed like a delinquent. He didn't have any visible tattoos or piercings, but that was only being stereotypical. He was quiet, which meant that there was the possibility of him being a loner.

Eren looked back at the boy. He had quite a bit of muscle on him on top of being tall, which mingled with his blank face making him look slightly intimidating. He was wearing a pendant of some kind, but the object at the end was hidden inside his black hoodie. There was nothing else about him that really stuck out.

"Over here, follow me," the man instructed.

They walked into the building and went straight to the end of the hall. The interior and ceiling was similar to the underground tunnel, mostly made of marble. The ceiling was upheld by tall cylindrical pillars of thick glass. There were a few people moving around, with files in their hands and talking with hasty tones on the phone. It looked like the other staff members were handling the students across the campus.

The man grunted. "Causing problems the minute you set foot on the island, you've got guts, or maybe you're just stupid."

Eren bit back a retort. No use in making things worse. Even the boy didn't say anything.

The man led them to a wooden door, which was bigger than any door in the building as far as Eren had seen.

"Wait here," he said, and he opened the door and walked in.

Eren and the boy stood in silence without saying a word to each other.

A minute later, he popped his head out the door. "Come in."

Eren and the boy walked in and stood in front of Clara Autumns, who was sitting behind her desk.

She was writing something on paper, and there was a stamp pad next to her arm. Without looking up, she spoke.

"So Mr. Benson here tells me that the both of you created a scene and had your pokemon out, and were just about to get into a serious battle, not to mention damaging school property, just before he arrived. Care to explain what happened?"

Eren knew the boy wouldn't say anything, since it was his fault. So he told the principal what had happened, starting from when he was walking with Reyna and Adelaide, up till the moment Mr. Benson arrived. Autumns looked at Eren with observing eyes, paying attention to everything he said without saying a word herself. Her intense gaze took in everything he said, but her face remained stoic.

"Then Mr. Benson came and told us that he was going to take us to you." Eren finished.

Autumns remained silent for a few seconds, then addressed the tall boy.

"Is there anything you want to say in your defense…Derek Raymond?"

Derek looked surprised that the principal knew his name, but he shook his head in reply

"No ma'am, it's my fault."

Eren was taken aback by the respectful way he replied. He had expected him to be ignorant or stubborn.

"Refrain from acting like that again Mr. Raymond, or you'll have to face the consequences," Autumns warned. Derek nodded silently.

"I'm also talking to you Mr. Fenrir," she then said to Eren.

"But I'm not at fault here Mrs. Autumns," Eren said, confused as to why he was also being scolded.

"While it's true that you didn't do anything wrong, just think about the situation. You dodged the lightning well enough. Don't you think your friends could have done the same? From the way you told me the situation, it doesn't sound like they're incapable. You became agitated too quickly with the situation and out of desperation called out your pokemon. The way you handled it is commendable, no doubt, but this could have been prevented had you taken everything into account."

Eren stood speechless. She was right. Reyna could have definitely dodged it, and would have pulled Adelaide to the side with her, and then he wouldn't have been in this situation.

Autumns held up her hand. "In my opinion, you did good Mr. Fenrir, I'm impressed. And don't take what I said too hard. After all, you've come here to learn and be prepared for anything. You learn through mistakes."

"Thank you Mrs. Autumns, I'll keep what you said in mind so that I can take a better decision next time," Eren said, straightening up.

"Same here," Derek mumbled.

Autumns brought her wrist up and checked her watch. "Looks like it's already time for the orientation."

She got up from her desk and passed both the students, only stopping at the door to say, "You might want to get to the stadium as quick as possible, I'll be saying some important stuff there, and you'll need to listen to it. Both of you are the first freshman of this year that I've met, and both of you seem promising in your own unique ways. Work hard and show me just how good you are."

She finished with a smile and closed the door as she left.

Mr. Benson hadn't said a word during the time in which Autumns was present in the room. He faced the two first years with a scowl on his face. "You got lucky this time. Stay out of trouble or I'll bring you back here, and then we'll see if you get away with it," he threatened. Eren was unimpressed, but he found it funny honestly. He opened the door and stormed out, leaving Eren and Derek alone in the room.

"What a stingy guy," Derek growled.

"I'll agree with you on that," Eren commented.

The two boys looked at each other. A few moments of silence passed before Derek spoke up.

"Look here, I'm not going to apologize for anything, so don't even say ask me to. I'm not really even sorry just so you know."

' _And for a minute here I though this guy was decent._ ' Eren thought.

He shook his head. "I didn't expect you to be either. But apologize to my friends if you can, you could at least do that much."

Derek thrust his hands into his pocket and turned around.

I'll think about it," he muttered.

He turned to leave, taking a few steps before Eren called out, "I'll battle you."

Derek turned around, an unreadable expression on his features. "Huh? I didn't get you."

Eren sighed. "I'll say it again then. When classes start and we're allowed to, I'll battle you. So keep your shit together till then and don't attack random people."

Derek grunted.

"Whatever, don't chicken out when the time comes," he remarked, heading to the door.

Eren grinned as he caught a faint smile play on the corner of Derek's lips.

"Yeah sure, in your dreams."

* * *

By the time Eren exited the main office, Derek was gone.

"The hell? He's already gone," Eren said to himself, swinging his head around to see if he could see Derek's tall figure in the distance.

He couldn't see the boy anywhere, but he could see the stadium, which was situated not too far from where he was. He adjusted the chest strap of his backpack and tightened it, making sure it was tight enough to feel comfortable and perform its job of not letting the bag slip. He stretched a little before getting into a running pose.

"Gotta get there in time. Come on Fenrir, 3..2..1..Go!"

He dashed off at after the word 'go'. Technically the directions were unknown to him, but seeing as the stadium was in sight he just made a beeline for it. The wind felt cool on his face as he bolted through the campus. He passed and darted through students who were in the way, having a few close calls but not bumping into anyone.

Eren loved to run. It was refreshing and he always felt more energetic after a nice run. He didn't get tired much as it was a habit of his to run a little each day. After all, there should be at least some physical activity every day.

Eren spared a quick glance at his watch. Surprisingly, half an hour had passed since the whole incident with Derek and Autumns had occurred and it was nearly six o'clock. The sun wasn't setting anytime soon since it was only September. Fall hadn't even set in completely, so breezes were the only thing besides good weather.

When he neared the stadium he saw that it was huge, as huge as the professional stadiums shown on TV. He saw a small number of students heading through an entrance on his left. He made a sharp turn and sprinted there. He didn't slow down there and swerved carefully through the people up the stairs.

He stopped once he reached the end of the stairs and in the seating area. He unbuckled his chest strap and looked around for Adelaide and Reyna, moving to the side where he wouldn't block the other first years that were coming up. He raked his tousled hair back its original style, a rebellious lock of dark chestnut loosely hanging above his left brow nonetheless.

Eren saw that the stadium most certainly wasn't filled completely. He took a wild guess that there were about three hundred students present at that moment. Quite a number of first years.

"Eren!"

He searched to see who had called him. The voice had come from his left and he turned to see Reyna waving at him from the benches, Adelaide beside her. He jogged his way to them, jumping around the benches.

"Yo! When did you get here?" he asked, flopping down on the bench.

"It's been a while, but never mind that! What happened with the principal?" Adelaide prompted.

"Nothing really, she let him off with a warning and me with some advice. And she said she expected good things from us as freshmen. She gave me some good advice honestly, she's experienced and knows her stuff," he said, taking his backpack off and placing it near his feet.

Reyna shifted next to him and Adelaide sat next to Reyna.

"She let him off after what he did to you?' she said with an edge to her voice.

Eren laughed. "Chill Reyna, nothing happened, so no worries!"

He put his arms behind his head.

"I promised that gu-Derek. I promised Derek a battle once classes start. It's better than him going around pestering everyone for a battle," Eren said.

Adelaide relaxed into her seat. "Well everything got sorted out in the end, so we're good. Oh and look! Autumns is here!"

Both Reyna and Eren directed their attention to the main field, where a small podium had been arranged in the center. There were two men, probably teachers Eren guessed, standing on either side of the podium. Both of them were tall, the one on the right more than the other. The man on right was very muscular, with thick and burly arms. His hair was grey, nearing white, and of neck length. He seemed to have tied it in a small ponytail at the base of his skull. He was wearing a black muscle shirt (which definitely accentuated his muscles) and khaki cargo pants. A necklace hung from his strong neck, displaying something that looked awfully close to teeth. He was scanning the crowd of students. Eren saw an eager expression on his face as if he were waiting for something to happen sometime soon.

The other teacher looked normal compared to him. He stood a few inches shorter and had brown hair that reached his shoulders. His skin was sickly pale in color and he had a slightly sharp jaw. He was dressed in beige slacks and a navy blue button-up shirt with an ivory tie to match.

Autumns was making her way to the center with another lady, who walked behind her. Maybe a secretary or something like that. The other students hadn't noticed her and were still chattering amongst themselves.

Autumns stepped on the podium and adjusted the mic. The other lady stood behind the podium, the three people surrounding it making a triangle. Autumns cleared her throat into the mic to get everyone's attention.

It effectively worked, and all the students settled down, silence hanging over them.

Autumns spoke loud and clear.

"Hello students, and welcome to Affinitive Academy! My name is Clara Autumns and I'm your principal. It's a pleasure to see you all reach Quake Island safe and sound. As you know, this will be your home for the upcoming three years. In these three years, you will learn many things, things that you may never even have heard of. This is a place for you to hone your skills and achieve greatness."

She took a pause to look around. Applause resonated throughout the stadium.

"All the teachers here strive to help you all reach your respective goals, and they will devote their time in making sure you're ready for anything. If you have any problems don't hesitate to meet a teacher or me. Now, there are certain rules that we have in the academy which are to be followed. First of all, no battling inside the school premises unless you have a permit from a teacher or some authority is overlooking it. Second, curfew is at midnight. Any student seen outside after that time should know that he or she will face the consequences. Third, if any student is caught using any kind of drugs or alcohol on the campus, then that student will be expelled without a doubt."

She took another pause, this time no one making so much as a sound. The two supposed teachers stood unmoving on either side of the podium, a steadfast gaze set on the students.

"That's all for the main rules, you'll get to know more soon as your teachers tell you."

Autumns beckoned the lady behind her, speaking a few words into her ear. The woman nodded, and scurried back to where they had entered from.

"Another thing to keep in mind is that various events are carried throughout the year and active participation is encouraged. This is the place to shine and show your efforts and talents. There are three semesters and examinations will be held at the end of each semester. Other subjective tests are the decision of the teachers." She put her hands on her hips and beamed at the first years. "That's the gist of it! Now this wasn't mentioned in your letters so think of it as another greeting, although this happens every year, no freshman ever gets to know of this tradition beforehand. We present to you, an exhibition battle between our top battle students who have just entered their third year!"

There was a series of collective gasps from the freshmen, which then turned into cheers.

"Whoa!"

"This is awesome!"

Eren himself was surprised and an a little excited on the inside. A battle between the top battle students of the academy? _COOL_.

Autumns held up her hand. "Hold on a second. First things first, the earlier announcement for the other students to return to their dorms was done mistakenly, and they have the permission to view the exhibition battle too. Make room for your upperclassmen everybody, and get to know them!"

She stepped down and the man wearing the button-up shirt dragged the podium away. The grey-haired man went into a conversation with Autumns, both of them deep into it. Eren was curious to who the man was. He wanted to know. Something about that man just seemed really…cool.

Adelaide was trying to contain her piqued emotions, but wasn't doing so well with it. She was jumping up and down on her seat.

"We're actually going to see a battle between the top battle students!? That's so AWESOME!" she squealed.

"Aye, calm down," Eren said, chuckling at her antics.

"I'm more excited to see the pokemon that they have, just how strong do you think they'll be?" Reyna wondered out loud.

Since Reyna aspired to be a pokemon breeder, it was a little obvious that she would think more about other peoples' pokemon. How strong they were, how healthy they actually were and many other factors were the things she always observed regarding about every pokemon she would meet or interact with. And since she had helped run the daycare alongside her parents, she had met plenty of pokemon and mingled with them.

It wasn't long before the upperclassmen started to pour in and were quick to fill up the rest of the stadium. Eren was surprised by the sheer number of students, hardly any seat was spared. He doubted even _half_ of the second and third years were here to witness the exhibition battle. Being the top battle students of the school definitely meant that they were popular to a great extent, which is why the other students would come to watch their battle.

Maybe he could become the top battle student someday, then he would be really popular and strong. All the students would come to see his battles, and maybe someone would make a fan club for him. Eren laughed to himself. What a joke. That was just dreaming big, being the top battle student would take a lot of hard work and effort. But what if….

"Hey there! Mind if my friends and I take these seats?"

Eren was snapped out of his thoughts when someone addressed him.

His head whipped up to look at a towering figure standing next to him. Well, towering was an overstatement, since Eren wasn't exactly short. The boy seemed to be only a few inches taller than him. His spiky ginger hair caught the setting sun's rays, and it seemingly blazed like a flame. His bright green eyes were like orbs which shone just as bright as his hair. It was a little difficult to see due to the sun being behind the boy, but his face was dotted with freckles and there was a wide grin plastered on his face.

"Not at all, go ahead," Eren replied.

"Thanks. I'm Calloway Fullbright." He sat down next to Eren, while his two friends sat next to him. "I'm a second year student. These are my friends."

He gestured towards the girl and the boy next to him.

The girl, who was quite short, probably just barely touching five feet, gave a friendly wave. She was thin but her limbs were long. She had a heart-shaped face and child-like cheeks, above which were icy blue eyes. Her blonde hair reached her shoulders in smooth waves. She looked very similar to Adelaide in Eren's opinion. She even dressed as fashionable as the blonde first year. Her attire consisted of a soft sea green tunic over white leggings. A sleeveless shimmering gold cardigan was draped over her tunic and reached her knees.

"Hi there. I'm Lillianna Crownfate." The girl introduced herself politely.

"And thaaattt over there is Ves!" Calloway pointed to the boy beside Lillianna.

The boy waved at him. He was only just shorter than Eren, and had dark brown hair on the verge of green, which was combed in short bangs. He had a pair of goggles hanging around his neck for some reason.

"I'm Vesper Greyhound, but I guess you can call me Ves too," he said with an indifferent shrug.

Adelaide and Reyna had heard the three introductions and they introduced themselves too.

"So you're second years right? Who are the top battle students?" Eren asked.

Everyone besides Reyna seem surprised at the question he put forward.

Vesper literally looked at him like he was from a different planet, while Calloway just quirked an eyebrow, his blazing hair blinding Eren momentarily. Lillianna took up the job of telling him who they were.

"It's not really surprising that you wouldn't know actually, so don't mind that. The top battle students of the academy are Zac and Jake. Both of them are from Kanto and are childhood friends and rivals. They've been the top since the end of their first year."

"Oh cool they're from Kanto too!" Reyna exclaimed.

Eren was impressed once again by something on the island.

"Since their first year? Wow that's pretty cool," Eren said.

Calloway joined the conversation at that point.

"They're the idols of a lot of the battle students in the academy. Not to mention their other childhood friend Lily is quite fine too…"

He trailed off as he put a finger on his chin and had the same grin plastered on his face from before, just a bit wider.

"Stupid idiot," Lilianna muttered.

Eren and his two companions chuckled lightly at the older boy's words. He was starting to like these people already. The gates to the stadium had been closed, and the seats full. Down on the field, a couple of people were running to each end and edge, most likely checking for any problems. Autumns could be seen at a corner where there was a small gate, the tall grey haired man still beside her.

Adelaide suddenly jumped up. "Look look! They're here!" She pointed towards the corner where Autumns stood.

Eren saw two boys emerge from the corner entrance, one with a huge smile on his face and the other a calm look. The crowd of students went wild. They were jumping out of their seats and cheering as if they would never get to cheer again. Even Vesper, who had been silent not too long back, was cheering at the top of his voice similar to Adelaide.

Eren whistled. "Hot damn."

Calloway laughed at Eren's comment. "They're great crowd-raisers, that's for sure. But wait till you see them battle."

Zac, the one with the big smile on his face enthusiastically waved to the crowd from the center of the field while Jake, just stood next to him with his arms crossed. He looked kind of cool doing that actually. Autumns walked up to the two third years with a mic in her hand, and addressed the students.

"Looks like there's no need to tell you all to welcome our top battle students, right?"

The cheering only intensified. Reyna covered her ears with the palms of her hand, but had a smile on her face. She looked at Eren.

"Isn't this cool Eren?" she shouted over the commotion. Eren nodded in reply.

Autumns spoke up again and the cheering slowly faded.

"So, for those of you who don't know, these are our top battle students Zac and Jake and they'll show you just what it means to be strong trainers. This will be a one-on-one single battle, are you ready?"

She smiled as the students collectively yelled a 'Yeah!'

Zac lightly punched his friend's shoulder and said something to him. Jake smirked and said something back to which Zac laughed. They turned around and went to opposite ends of the field. Autumns went to the same corner she was in before.

The crowd was silent, eagerly anticipating the start of the battle. Reyna dug into her bag and fished for something. Four pairs of eyes looked at her inquisitively, Eren's not one of them.

She pulled a tripod out and quickly set it up in front of her feet. Her hand went back to her bag and this time she pulled out a DSLR. She mounted it onto the stand and turned it on.

"What are you doing?" Adelaide asked curiously.

"I like photography, and recording battles too. I use it for reference purposes, to usually draw ideas from different battling styles," Reyna answered as she tuned the video settings.

"That's a good thing to do, it could come in handy someday," Calloway commented, his blazing hair blinding Eren momentarily, again.

"Turn it on Reyna, they're about to get started," Lillianna said, drawing the groups eyes to the field.

Zac was talking to the pokeball in his hand while Jake just looked at Zac from the other side.

Autumns cleared her throat, her voice spreading over the area.

"And so, let the battle begin!" she shouted.

"Go Kong!"

"Let's do this King!"

The crowd went wild once again as Zac and Jake tossed their pokeballs in the air. There were two bright flashes and two huge pokemon dropped down, literally _cracking_ the ground beneath them.

"It's Kong! Zac's totally got this in the bag!"

"King is going to wipe the floor with Kong!"

Students were already taking the sides of their idols. Reyna had already started recording and all eyes were on the field. Eren was excited to see how this would turn out.

Jake's machamp, King, flexed his four arms and roared. Contrary to King, Zac's slaking, Kong, just yawned and rubbed its head lazily. Both of them looked strong to Eren. King had the advantage type-wise, but something like type advantages wouldn't decide the battle for such strong trainers. He wondered how this would go down.

Jake decided to take the initiative.

"King, use bulk up!" he shouted. King took a stance and yelled 'Champ!'

He became surrounded with a magenta aura and his muscles suddenly bulked up. It looked like he was going for the stat raisers first.

"Hmm, that's a nice start. Increasing his attack and defense at the start so he can weaken Kong from the start," Eren said.

Calloway and Lillianna nodded in agreement.

Instead of taking a countermeasure, Zac only called out to Kong.

"Don't sweat it Kong, let him come to you. And don't laze around please, I'll give you a lot of bananas if you fight well!"

Kong heard what his trainer said, but didn't respond to it any way.

Jake took to opportunity to try and land a hit.

"King get in close and use cross chop!"

King moved surprisingly fast for such a big pokemon, and he took long and strong strides towards Kong. A few feet before reaching Kong, King leaped into the air. He crossed his arms midair and was poised to land on the big ape.

"Machamp!" King yelled and he landed the hit on Kong. The slaking only brought its huge arms to defend itself. It was a direct hit and Kong's arms took the brunt of the attack. He skidded back, kicking up bits of dust as he struggled to stay firm, but was soon overpowered in an unfavorable position and was thrown back.

The crowd gasped, before cheering again.

"You see that! King struck the first blow!"

"Kong is down!"

"That was a really strong hit, not to mention powered up by bulk up," Adelaide commented.

Vesper nodded. "Jake usually starts his battles with stat based moves to gain the upper hand, and for the majority, they're quite effective."

Eren thought that Jake had a good idea for a solid start in a battle. Eren looked at Kong, who was just getting up, shaking the dirt off of his body. He was shocked to see that the cross chop had barely done anything, and Kong was standing scratching his head as if nothing had happened at all.

Zac smirked. "Kong, use slack off!"

"Slaaaa," Kong said, relaxing his body. He hadn't seemed affected by the cross chop but there were bruises on his arms, indicating that the attack really had been strong. A green aura surrounded his body, and slowly the bruises disappeared and Kong was back to full health.

"Looks like it's back to square one," Lilianna said.

Eren wondered how Jake was going to overcome the 'slack off' strategy. It would be quite annoying if Zac used that frequently. Reyna adjusted the camera for a better view.

"Let's go Kong, use hammer arm!" Zac yelled.

Kong began moving towards King, slowly increasing his pace as he got closer. Abruptly, similar to King he jumped, quite high too. His arm began glowing and he prepared to bring it down.

"Don't let him touch you King, intercept with dynamic punch!" Jake called out.

With two of his four arms glowing, King met Kong's hammer arm with his dynamic punch. The two attacks connected fiercely and an explosion of pure brawn occurred, creating an obscuring haze around the two pokemon. Wind and dust from the explosion battered Zac and Jake across the length of the field and they had to plant their feet in order not to get blown away, along with covering their faces with their arms.

There was a series of 'whoa' and 'amazing!' from the students, who were jumping out of their seats again, pumping their fists in the air.

"Holy shit that was awesome," Eren breathed. He was awestruck by the power the two pokemon packed.

' _So this is what it means to be top battler,_ ' he thought.

Calloway and Lillianna both calmly watched, while Vesper and Adelaide were on the edge of their seats. Reyna seemed to be enjoying the battle too.

"Getting everything on tape?" he whispered as leaned towards her. She flashed him a thumbs up.

"Yep, everything."

Meanwhile, the smoke had almost cleared up. Zac and Jake gazed intensely through the haze at their pokemon. King and Kong were both standing not too far from each other, but this time both of them were visibly injured and panting.

"They're so strong!"

"This is what you call a battle!"

Eren had to agree with the surrounding students. _This_ was a battle. Even though he wasn't the one battling, he could feel the rush.

Zac was the first to call out an attack this time.

"Use double team Kong and surround King!"

Suddenly there were copies of Kong enclosing King in the circle. King looked around, unable to readily distinguish which one was the real Kong.

"Now follow it up with yawn!"

Kong and his copies all yawned widely. Seeing them somehow made Eren feel a little drowsy too.

But for some reason, King didn't even try to dodge and he just stood still.

"Huh? Why didn't Jake tell King to jump out of the way?" Adelaide asked, confused by Jake not taking any action.

"I think I have a good idea why." Eren looked at Adelaide. "Let's keep on watching, to see if I'm right."

Adelaide pouted, not happy with the suspense, but didn't say a word.

"Alright King, use stone edge to get rid of the copies."

Jake was still calm, further supporting Eren's theory of what he thought Jake was going for.

King was surrounded by two blue rings and he aimed his four arms out wide. Rocks appeared from the rings and shot out at the copies, making each one disappear. The real Kong only moved to side to avoid the attack.

Before anyone could call out something else, King fell onto one knee, one of his arms on his head.

"So yawn's effects are kicking in pretty quickly," Lillianna noted.

Within moments, King fell back in a sitting position and was instantly asleep.

The crowd gasped.

"What's going to happen now?"

"It's over, it's Zac's win already."

Eren scoffed at the comments. They were so quick to decide things.

"Alright this is our chance Kong, use full power repeated scratch attacks!"

Eren nearly laughed at his choice of an attack, before seeing what Kong did. Kong's scratches were vicious, each one creating gashes on King's body.

Eren shuddered. That was honestly one scary scratch attack.

King didn't awaken even due to the scratches, but there was a faint reddish aura, barely visible, but it was there.

Eren smiled to himself. He had been right. So that _was_ what Jake had been going for all along, but how was he going to use it to his advantage if King was asleep?

"Things aren't looking too good for King," Calloway said, eyes fixed on the two pokemon.

Suddenly Jake cried out.

"Sleep talk King, do it!"

Still asleep, King abruptly stood up, unbalancing Kong. He lashed with his left arm and punched Kong straight in the gut, twisting his fist for some extra power. Kong's face contorted in pain and astonishment as his breath was knocked out of him. All eyes in the stadium went wide open at the sight in front of them.

"Genius!" Eren cried out, a huge grin on his face. He had been right, but he hadn't expected this to happen.

Vesper whirled to look at him. "Come on, spill the beans. What were you thinking of?" Adelaide nodded too, unable to keep up with the suspense any longer.

Eren held up a finger.

"It's pretty easy to notice actually. First Jake lets King get hit by yawn. It made him sleep. Now that's not really a good thing, but Jake used it to his advantage, how?"

Lillianna's mouth fell open. "Guts!" she exclaimed.

"Bingo!" Eren remarked.

"Guts is an ability that increases attack when inflicted with some kind of a status like poison or a burn, you know that. The only problem was how to use guts' power if King was asleep. So Jake used sleep talk, a gamble actually. It could have been any attack, but by the looks of it, Jake got lucky and King used the strongest attack he could at that moment, care to take a guess anyone?"

Everyone looked back to the field, where Kong had landed far from King, whose attack had _launched_ him skywards. Kong had suffered heavy damage and it could easily be seen. Zac was astonished by the sudden turn of events and gawked at his pokemon.

Reyna was the one who answered Eren's question.

"King used revenge. It doubled the damage dealt by Kong's scratches and counting its earlier stat increase, it was one _killer_ move. I wouldn't be surprised if Kong is down for the count."

Vesper and Adelaide were amazed by Jake's genius strategy. Calloway and Lillianna nodded in approval, their heads bobbing up and down. Eren found it amusing how they were in sync with each other. They must have known each other for quite a while or so.

"Nice guess," Eren whispered to Reyna. She clucked her tongue.

"You shouldn't expect any less."

"Sure."

"Not bad guessing what Jake was doing either, I'm impressed."

"You underestimate me, woman."

Reyna stuck her tongue out at Eren.

Adelaide giggled at their interactions. She then pointed to the field.

"Look! Kong is getting up!"

Sure enough, Kong steadied himself. He was quite battered but the lazy look on his face still hadn't budged. He could still move, which Jake wasn't looking too smug about.

"Alright Kong! I need you to get in as close as you can to King," Zac called, happy that Kong could still move.

Kong grunted a reply and began trudging towards King, who was still asleep. The crowd was on the edge of their seats, waiting for what would happen next. Kong was getting closer with each step, and King wasn't showing any signs of waking up. It was a race against time for both the pokemon.

But the winner of the race was quickly decided as Kong stood above the sleeping machamp.

"Now, fire a point blank hyper beam!" Zac shouted.

Jake's eyes went wide and he called out to King.

"Wake up King! Quick!"

But it wasn't heard. Kong's mouth began to form a big ball of pure white energy and looked ready to fire it any second. At that moment, King's eyes slowly creaked open, not even completely recognizing what was happening.

Jake saw that his pokemon had awoken and called out to him again, urgency coating his voice.

"Get out of the way King!"

Kings eyes flew open completely, finally registering what was going on. But it was too late.

"Fire it Kong!"

Everyone gaped, ready to see a point blank hyper beam hit its target..but it never happened. The charged attack disappeared from Kong's mouth and he flopped down.

"What th- oh shit! Why now!" he cursed.

Jake saw it as an opening and ordered King another attack.

"This is our chance King, seismic toss!"

King jumped to his feet and rammed into Kong, grabbing his wide body with his four arms, and hoisting him up with all his might.

"Not good for Zac, it looks like Kong's ability Truant kicked in at the wrong moment!" Lilianna cried out.

Eren understood what happened now. Truant made Kong loaf around, and this was the worst timing possible at the moment.

King was already weakened by the numerous scratches he had received, but he lifted Kong up with pure determination burning in his eyes.

Zac was too shocked to command Kong, and it didn't look like Kong was in any mood to do anything at all.

"Do it!" Jake yelled.

"CHAAMMMMPP!"

King let out a huge cry and jumped, cracking the ground with the reaction force. He jumped high, unbelievably high for a pokemon who had been damaged so much.

All eyes went up as they looked at the sheer strength King displayed. King had reached the highest point and was now starting to drop, Kong in his arms.

King began picking up speed, Kong's weight aiding him.

Eren looked at Zac's face, expecting shock or surprise on his features, but was confused when he saw a calm smile.

' _Why is he smiling in such a situation?_ ' he thought.

Zac took a deep breath, and then suddenly shouted, very loudly.

"I'll give you ten times as many bananas if you fight back with all your might!"

Saying something like that seemed very stupid in a way, but it actually broke Kong out of his stupor. He roared all of a sudden, startling King and Jake. Kong wriggled around somehow and locked King in his arms with newfound strength.

Zac laughed gleefully. "That's my boy! Now let's get serious, use your momentum and use earthquake!"

Jake, realizing that an attack of that magnitude could mean deep trouble, called out once again to King.

"Break out of it King!"

King struggled against Kong's grip, but it was pointless. The ape had a grip stronger than iron.

"SLAAA!"

Kong plummeted to the ground faster than King had before and smashed into the field. The crowd was speechless as they watched Kong's attack destroy the field. King was slammed head first into the ground and huge chunks of rocks were uprooted. For a minute it seemed as if time had slowed down. Chunks of the field were floating above ground level. The small rocks and dust were frozen in the air. It was a breathtaking sight. But it didn't stay like that. The rocks crashed back to the ground and Kong rolled off King, who lay in a miniature crater.

Not a single student moved a muscle. All eyes were fixated on the rugged, destroyed field.

Eren had no words for what had just happened. He'd seen many pokemon battles before, online and live, but he had never seen anything like this. _Ever._ Adelaide, Reyna and the three second years' expressions were similar to his own.

The cheers of the mass of students was riotous. They were jumping and yelling at the top of their voices.

"Whoa what just happened?!"

"What's up with that crazy strength?!"

Zac had a victorious smirk on his face and was getting ready to celebrate, when King slowly got up from the ground, swaying in place a little. Kong looked impressed by its opponent's tenacity.

Jake smiled. "I knew you'd get through it bud," he said, flashing a thumbs up. King smiled and flashed a thumbs up right back at his trainer.

"Look at King go!" Eren remarked, clapping silently. His friends nodded in agreement, too engrossed to reply.

Zac let out a laugh. "I expected no less from my rival. Good job." He adopted a more serious look. "But I'm not letting you win this."

"I don't expect you to make it easy anyway," Jake replied.

The atmosphere around them had suddenly changed. Eren could feel the tension up where he was sitting.

Zac was the first to attack.

"Kong, no slacking off now, we're gonna win this! Use hammer arm on the broken rocks and hit them towards King full power!" he shouted.

In reply, Kong bumped his glowing arms against one another and rushed to the fallen rocks. With a roar he swung his arms around and smacked the rocks. The rocks actually broke into smaller rocks, about the size of ten basketballs, and were projected towards King with deadly precision and power.

"We won't back down either King! Use karate chop and break all the incoming rocks!" Jake commanded.

It was a sight to see. Kong was like a machine who kept pelting the rocks towards the King, who was like a batsman chopping the rocks and sending many of them back. But it didn't last long as King couldn't cut a huge rock. In a last moment attempt to save himself from injury he jumped to the side.

"Not there King!" Jake cried out. But it was too late.

Zac smirked. "Alright, we're finishing it this time Kong! Let! It! Rip!"

"SLAAKINGG!"

King had not noticed that with each pelted rock, Kong had gotten closer. He had been too busy chopping the rocks to see him suddenly appear. A shining ball of white light was in his mouth, and King doubted he would get lucky this time. The hyper beam hit full on and King was launched like toy across the field. He crashed into the wall behind Jake so fast, he barely saw it. Jake and Autumns both rushed to check on the pokemon.

King was literally embedded in the wall, unconscious and unmoving. Autumns looked over King once more before raising her hand and pointing at Zac.

"And the winner of the exhibition match is Zac!" she declared with a smile on her face.

The audience jumped out of their seats and clapped and vociferated.

"Awesome battle!"

"Both of them battled so well!"

Eren and his companions joined in on the clapping.

Eren's heart was thumping against his chest. There was an indescribable feeling inside of him. He felt empowered by it, despite not knowing what it was.

' _So this is what it means to be a top battler._ '

* * *

 **And that's chapter two! And here are the newly introduced OCs with their respective owners:**

 **Calloway Fullbright- The Awkward Trumpet**

 **Lillianna Crownfate- Oly In Flight**

 **Vesper Greyhound- NitroTheKid88**

 **Don't be disappointed if your character hasn't appeared yet, there's a lot of other ones which I have to manage into each chapter, so bear with me on that.**

 **On that note, submissions are still open, so feel free to submit a character before I close it. I hope you enjoyed the chapter and the battle, I put quite a bit of visual effort into it to be able to write it out.**

 **Thanks for reading!**

 **~Lightning**


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

The scenes of the fight were etched into his brain. It had been only about fifteen minutes since the exhibition battle had ended and the crowd's adrenaline had worn off, but the battle was still fresh in everyone's minds. No one could stop talking about it.

"Can you believe how unfortunate it was that Truant kicked in at such a time?"

"King's endurance was unbelievable, did you see how many attacks he took?"

"That was one helluva battle!"

The crowd's adrenaline had dissipated, but Eren could still feel it in him. He had a sudden urge to battle someone, anyone would do. But the earlier events with Derek made him stay put.

"You look like you're ready to brawl or something, you've got crazed eyes, calm down." Reyna said while packing her camera and tripod back into her bag.

Eren realized how stupid he probably looked and relaxed. "Sorry about that."

He looked around, wondering if anyone else had seen him like that. Luckily no one besides Reyna had, the others had their attention somewhere else.

"Hey hey, Eren! Wasn't the battle amazing?" Adelaide gushed.

Eren chuckled. The blonde girl was still as excited as she was before the battle. But he agreed with her.

"Yeah, it sure was."

Calloway got up from his seat next to Eren and looked down at him. He held his hand out.

"It was nice meeting you man. Second years have to leave now. See you around." He said.

Eren shook his hand. "Same here, see you around. You too Lillianna and Vesper," he said, turning to the two other upperclassmen.

Lillianna smiled and Vesper gave a small grin and a nod. The three of them waved to Reyna and Adelaide too.

The second years all began to leave one by one and the strength of the students was diminished to about three hundred or so once again. Zac and Jake had left not too long after their battle and now only the teachers were present with the first years.

Autumns stepped up to the podium once all the second years had left and addressed the freshmen one last time for the day.

"We hope you enjoyed the exhibition battle! We wanted to show you that you can also become strong trainers and succeed in anything you want as long as you work hard! Now, you will be directed towards your respective dorms by our teachers stationed outside the stadium. Follow the directions and don't stray off. Classes start tomorrow for you all, but it will be a half day, so you'll be allowed to explore more of the island in your free time. Have a great learning experience!"

She ended her speech and the present students clapped. She left along with the lady who was beside her before.

Eren picked his bag up and looked at the two girls.

"Let's find out which dorms we're in." he said. They both nodded and mimicked his actions, picking up their bags, and followed him to the exit. A line of students had already formed, and the three of them joined it.

It took another ten minutes before Eren's turn came. He was surprised to see the burly ponytailed teacher from before. Up close he looked even more ripped and intimidating. His nose was crooked and his stormy blue eyes seemed to bore straight through him.

"Name?" he asked, in quite a loud voice. A few students jumped at the sudden rise in volume.

"Eren Fenrir." He replied without any hesitation.

The man skimmed through the sheets in his big hands. "Let's see.. ..Eren! You're in dorm Ignis! That's the dorm I manage, for your information. You can find the directions from here on the signboard just outside the stadium. It's not too far, so you're lucky. Enjoy your stay and let's hope you're one of the gutsy freshmen of this year!"

Eren wasn't sure what this guy's interpretation of 'gutsy' was, but he gave a brisk nod. His boisterous voice boomed over the area, unnerving a few of the students.

A few whispers starting passing around Eren.

"This guy is kinda scary you know."

"He creeps me out."

"I hope he doesn't teach me."

Eren gritted his teeth at the comments. This teacher was in front of them and they had the nerve to say such things? Pretty pathetic.

But he man didn't seem to mind, in fact he ignored everything and smiled at Eren.

"On your way young man, next!"

Eren walked down the same set of stairs he'd come up from. The area outside the stadium was vacant except for the group of first years crowded in front of the signboard. Eren pushed his way through, and stood in front of the signboard. It was a detailed map of the campus, with properly sized and shaped symbols for each of the buildings. He scanned the map for any familiar buildings and saw the main student office, not too far his current standing. He looked around the stadium for a big red square, possibly the denotation for the 'Fire' dorm. He found it towards the left of the stadium, next to the cafeteria.

Eren smiled to himself. ' _Sweet heavens food is close._ '

"Eren! You there?"

Eren turned to Adelaide's voice and he slipped out through the surrounding people to see her and Reyna jogging towards him.

"Which dorm did you get?" he asked once they stopped in front of him.

"Ignis!" Reyna exclaimed.

"Aqua!" Adelaide said, with comparatively less enthusiasm.

"That's on the other side of the Ignis dorm," Eren said with a frown on his face.

"I wish we were in the same dorm." Adelaide pouted, her arms crossed over her chest.

"No worries, we can still meet up anytime. We've probably got a lot of similar classes anyway," Reyna assured. Eren nodded in agreement.

"Reyna's right, we'll meet up each day anyways. Catch you later!"

Adelaide grinned and turned away to head towards the Aqua dorm. "See you tomorrow!"

Reyna and Eren turned to the left and walked on in the direction of their new housing. The sun had almost completely set now and the sky was a dark orange, the clouds a light purple hue. It was a peaceful evening.

"Hey Reyna, want to race to the dorm?" Eren asked.

Reyna scowled. "You're asking me even though you know I can't beat you?"

Eren shrugged. "It was worth a try. Let's just walk our way to the dorm then."

They walked in silence for a few moments before Eren spoke up again.

"By the way, the cafeteria looked BIG on the map."

Reyna let out a groan of exasperation.

* * *

It wasn't long before they reached Ignis dorm. The building was quite large and there were numerous windows everywhere. It stood at about ten stories tall and five buses wide. It was painted dark red and above the entrance there was a board, with the words 'IGNIS DORM' written in gold. A single flame was painted above the board in complementary hues of orange, yellow and red.

There was a garden to the right of the dorm, which was unoccupied at the time, with many flowers and benches, which were spread around in a pattern. But there was nothing else in the immediate vicinity of the dorm. The other buildings were up ahead, not very close, but at a walkable distance. The closest was the cafeteria, which Eren felt pretty good about.

The two Kanto natives walked in through the automatic glass doors of the dorm. Eren let out a sigh of relief as he was blasted with cool air from the air conditioner. The lobby was decorated in a similar fashion to the main student office, with the marble floor and tall cylindrical glass pillars. There was another line to the reception desk.

Eren joined the line with Reyna behind him. Soon it was his turn and he walked up to the desk. A pretty woman was sitting at the desk with a bright smile on her face, putting her perfectly white teeth on display. Her luscious golden blonde locks tumbled past her shoulders.

"Hi there! I'm Jenna and I'm the caretaker of the Ignis dorm. I'm also the vice-head of the dorm, and I look after the students here. Your name please?" she said in a very professional manner.

"Eren Fenrir."

Her fingers flew across the keyboard and her hazel eyes darted across the screen.

"Let's see..ah there you are, Eren Fenrir, from Kanto, 16 years old, birthday December 6, mother named Elise Fenrir and father named Jason Fenrir."

"Yep, that's me." He answered.

Jenna hit the enter key and the sound of printing came from the machine next to her. A card was freshly printed and handed to him. It had his photo and the words 'Affinitive Academy' in bold at the top.

"That's your student ID card, keep it with you at all times. All your pokemon are registered onto that and you're supposed to register any new ones you catch too. You need it to go to your classes, register for events, and it also acts as your credit card for buying anything from shops or vendors. It can be used all over Quake Island in nearly every shop or restaurant. Any prize money won during events is directly transferred to your card, so make sure not to lose it anywhere and refrain from giving it to anyone. Any questions?" she finished, giving him another smile.

He put the ID away in his wallet.

"Yeah, one actually. How often do you get hit on?"

Jenna blinked, then laughed. "Not as much as you probably think, but quite a bit actually. Seniors can be a pain, even some guests do. In fact, one of the freshmen just asked me to go out on a date with him and be his girlfriend, I said no and he seemed disappointed. But I only joined last year."

"There are other people waiting in line Eren, get going if you're done," Reyna said, pushing him out of the way.

Eren stuck his tongue out at Reyna before turning back to Jenna.

Jenna handed him a key. "Here's your room key, it's for room 414. Also, just for today, dinner is kept in each room for the students so they don't have to go the cafeteria after such a long journey. The cafeteria is open starting tomorrow at seven in the morning, so enjoy your breakfast too. Enjoy your stay at the dorm!" she gave another charming smile, one that could easily make men and boys go lovey-dovey.

Eren waved a bye and headed to the luggage counter at the corner of the lobby to pick up his baggage and headed up the stairs, instead of the elevator.

A minute or two of struggle later he found himself in front of room 414. He unlocked the door using the key Jenna had given. The lights were already on, indicating that his roommate was already here. He walked in and closed the door behind him. The room was very spacious and had a homely feel to it. Eren walked to the center of the room and dropped his luggage.

He looked around and saw that there were two beds with the sheets untouched and neatly arranged pillows. There were also two desks, right next each other, with a drifloon lamp on each of them. There was a closet next to each desk, white in color and not so wide, but enough for a single person. An air conditioner was situated at the top of the window, which was next to one of the beds. A small kitchen area was built in, immediately to the left of the main door. A coffee maker was placed next to a single stove and a mini fridge and freezer was also on the counter.

Affinitive Academy sure knew how to make people feel welcome. There was even a TV on the wall opposite to the window, next to the other bed.

Eren whistled. "This place is great, I'm impressed." He said aloud.

"My thoughts exactly," a voice behind him said.

He turned to see a boy with a slightly dark complexion standing behind him, his torso wrapped in a towel and chest bared with no shirt on. He had spiky brown hair and stood as tall as him.

Eren had no idea how to respond to someone agreeing with his words while standing bare chested and in a towel, and all he could say was, "Uh, nice."

The boy laughed. "Sorry for creeping you out like that, I didn't mean to but it kind of happened."

Eren recovering from his slight shock, shook his head.

"Nah it's ok. I was just a little surprised that's all."

The boy held out his hand. "I'm Brock, nice to meet you."

Eren shook his hand. "I'm Eren, nice to meet you too."

"Cool. You can take whichever bed you want, I don't mind. I'll change till then, make yourself at home."

Brock turned and walked into the bathroom again.

Eren decided to take the bed next to the window. He tossed his backpack on the bed and jumped on. His back sunk in to the bed and he closed his eyes. It felt just like his bed back at home, comfy and sleep-inducing.

He laid there till the sound of the bathroom door unlocking reached his ears.

"Comfy bed I take it?" Brock asked.

"Oh hell yeah. Feels like home alright." Eren replied, getting up.

Brock was dressed in a black t-shirt and plain shorts. He flopped down on the bed next to Eren.

"So where are you from Eren?"

"Viridian City, town of the strongest gym leader in the Kanto region," Eren proudly said.

Brock's eyes….moved? It was honestly hard to tell since they looked as if they were closed, or he was permanently squinting or something.

"Really? Wow we actually lived pretty close to each other then, I'm from Pewter City."

"I'm surprised I never saw you then, I've been to Pewter quite a few times."

Brock shrugged. "Doesn't really matter now that we've met here, speaking of which do you have a girlfriend?"

Eren had no idea how that was related to them never meeting before, but he had already decided Brock was a weird guy, not in a bad way, a little eccentric maybe. He mentally chided himself for judging someone yet again.

"I don't actually, considering our age I'm weird maybe."

Brock had a relieved look on his face.

"Not at all, I don't have one either. I was hoping my roommate wouldn't have one either, admittedly I would feel jealous."

Eren chuckled. "Maybe I would too if you had one."

Brock suddenly jumped out of his bed and pumped his fists into the air as if celebrating some victory.

"But there's probably loads of chicks and beautiful women here, it's paradiseeeee!" he shouted in glee.

Eren sweatdropped at the scene.

"I don't know about the chicks, but Jenna was definitely beautiful." He said.

Brock's head whipped down to look at him, his eyes in the shape of hearts, steam blowing from his nose.

"Oh Jenna darling was beautiful alright, what a woman! She rejected me but that doesn't change the fact that I won't try asking her out again!" he literally squealed.

Eren laughed nervously.

' _So Brock was the freshman who Jenna was talking about_ ' he thought amusedly.

The sound of a notification diverted his attention from the now hyper Brock. He took his phone out of his pocket and saw that it was a message from Reyna.

 _Met your roommate?_

Eren unlocked his phone and quickly typed; _Yeah, he's pretty interesting_.

Reyna's reply was almost instantaneous.

 _I'm coming to your room with my roommate, be there in a few._

Eren turned his phone off and looked at Brock, who was still gushing about to himself.

"Hey Brock, we're gonna have some company in a few. My friend is coming over with her roommate," he informed.

That got his attention real quick.

"Company you say? Female company? Hmm should I wear that suit I brought or.." he mumbled to himself.

"Chill, you're not going on a date. They're just coming here to meet us. They'll be here in a few." Eren said, amused at his roommate's antics. "I'm going to change, I'll be right back."

Leaving Brock to figure out what do, Eren took his bag with him in the bathroom.

The bathroom was also quite spacious, and was decked with soaps, gels, shampoos and many other things. Eren took off his clothes and slipped on a simple t-shirt and some shorts like Brock. He washed his face with one of the facewashes next to the granite water bowl. He dried his face with a towel and looked at himself in the mirror, raking a hand through his slightly wavy hair, a wet lock curving towards his eyebrow. His own ocean blue eyes stared back at him from inside the mirror.

He left the bathroom and saw that Brock was talking on the phone.

"Take care of everyone Forrest, I'm counting on you. I'll call you later."

"Your brother?" Eren asked once he had hung up, unpacking his luggage at the time.

Brock nodded. "Yeah, I'm the oldest in the family and he's the second oldest, so I told him to take care of everyone."

Before Eren could ask who 'everyone' was, there was a knock at the door.

"Must be Reyna, I'll get it." Eren said as he headed towards the door, but was stopped by Brock.

"Allow me to guide the ladies in," he said in a faux manly voice and he dashed to open the door.

Eren tilted his head to see past Brock's figure and squinted a little at the sudden flash of the corridor lights, which was considerably greater than the dim lights that had been switched on in the room.

"Hello there ladies, welcome to our humble abode," Brock said, his 'manly' voice still in play.

"It won't stay humble as long as Eren is there," Reyna stated aloud.

"I heard that," Eren called out.

"You were meant to."

Brock stood aside and let the girls walk in, closing the door behind them.

Eren's attention went to the girl beside Reyna. She was the shortest in the room, and was wearing baggy sweatpants and a t-shirt, which made her look even shorter than she probably was, though that didn't seem to affect her in any way. Her body was, well, deprived of the _joys_ of puberty, but she still looked attractive in her slim figure. Her almond locks were pulled back into a high ponytail and her bangs reached her long lashes, below which were bright steel grey eyes. Her hair was held up by a sapphire blue ribbon, which seemed to strangely complement her eyes.

Despite being tired from all the travelling Eren smiled at the new face.

"Hey, I'm Eren." He said. He was tired of introducing himself honestly, it was so plain and boring now. But he had no other way so he just did it.

"And my name is Brock, lovely ladies." Brock said, moving his eyebrows up and down.

The girl smiled back, ignoring what Brock had just done. "I'm Terra, nice to meet you. Sorry if I disturbed you in any way, I just wanted to meet new people and Reyna told me that she had a friend who was also here, so I asked her if we could get acquainted."

Eren shook his head. "We were just getting to know each other too actually, so it's a good thing you showed up," he said, throwing his arm around Brocks shoulder. Eren hoped he didn't mind, and was glad to see Brock smile a little at the gesture.

"So Brock, which course did you apply for?" Reyna asked.

"I want to be a breeder, so I applied for the Pokemon Caretaking course, along with battle classes and the other mandatory subjects," he answered.

"Oh cool! We have the same course!" Terra exclaimed. "Reyna said she was also working to be a breeder, so the three of us might be in the same classes quite often."

"Great, so I'm alone in the battle course," Eren mumbled.

Reyna walked up and lightly punched his shoulder. "Make new friends then. And it's not like we won't ever be in the same class." She suggested.

"Guess you're right about that," Eren said.

Terra clapped her hands together. "Oh I know! How about we explore the campus together after lunch tomorrow?"

"Sounds good to me. What classes do you guys have tomorrow?" Brock asked

"Let me check."

Eren had no idea which class he had tomorrow, so he grabbed his phone off the bed and clicked on the first app in the drawer, which said 'Affinitive Academy'. It was a smart idea to develop an application which the students could use to get their weekly schedules, curriculum and other details of the academy.

"Hmm let's see, I've got…Survival classes tomorrow at eight and- ok no, that's all. What about you guys?"

"I've got Appeal tomorrow at nine." Terra said

"I've got Pokemon History at nine," Reyna said.

"I'm with you in Survival Class Eren," Brock said, bumping fists with Eren.

"Nice. The timings are different but we can meet up at the cafeteria or the lobby at around eleven, if that's okay with you guys," Eren suggested. The lectures were about two hours long each for the first day, so eleven sounded pretty good.

The other three freshmen nodded in consent.

"Alright then, we'll meet up tomorrow, don't forget. See you guys."

Reyna turned and walked out the door.

Terra looked at both the boys and said, "Well it was nice to meet you guys, let's have fun and enjoy ourselves here!"

Eren laughed. "You sound too formal, chill. We'll have a lot of fun, no doubt about it."

Terra grinned and headed to the door, waving at the both of them.

"Bye guys!"

The door shut after her and silence hung in the room for a moment before Eren stretched his arms and sighed.

"I'm so damn hungry, how about we eat dinner Brocko?"

Brock eyed Eren curiously. "Brocko?"

Eren shrugged. "I don't think Broccoli would sound good you know."

Brock burst out laughing. "You've got a point there. I'm starving too, let's eat. I wonder what they gave us for dinner."

"Let's find out."

They both headed to the kitchen area to grab their trays. Rice and curry, a salad and pasta was what the academy had given.

Eren's mouth was watering with anticipation and he took the tray and sat on his bed, Brock sitting down the other. He opened the lids and unwrapped the foil and dug in with his spoon.

"Mmm, this is some good stuff!" Eren said happily.

Brock nodded in agreement.

"Tell me more about yourself Brock, what did you do in Pewter City?" Eren asked, stuffing his face all the while.

"Where should I start? Well you see..." Brock began.

The two roommates spent the rest of their time getting to know each other more and enjoying their dinner. Eren felt good about having a roommate like Brock, he seemed really dependable and nice. So far, coming to the academy had actually been a good decision, and he had to admit, he was feeling good about this place. He was looking forward to what kinds of things would happen from now on.

* * *

 _RIINGG!_

Eren was jolted awake from his blissful sleep by the scream of his alarm and he scrambled about trying to find where the little shit was so he could shut its mouth. His hands flew across the covers as he looked for it, not being able to rely on his eyes as his vision was blurred and the continuous blaring was getting on his nerves. At last, as he slowly came to his senses he found the alarm behind one of the pillows just between the wooden part of the bed and the mattress. But his hands and legs were tangled in the sheets and as he reached out to shut it he slipped off the bed and hung halfway between the bed and the floor.

"Fuck." Was all he could say. A vein popped in Eren's head as the alarm continued to blare.

"Good morning?" Brock said from beside him.

Eren turned to see him standing in shorts and drying his wet hair with a towel just outside the bathroom door. He tried to move his feet but ended up slipping even more and his head hit the floor.

Eren's head lolled to look at Brock.

"Good morning, good fucking morning indeed." Eren grumbled.

As he tried to untangle himself Brock walked over to turn the alarm off, an amused smile on his face. Eren somehow managed to get free of the bedsheets and he collapsed on the floor.

"I feel so energetic this morning, it's amazing," he drawled.

Brock chuckled.

"You might want to get dressed and ready for breakfast, we have a survival class to attend. Oh and wear shorts, that's what I read about the survival course, there's a lot of stuff that happens so we're supposed to wear something comfortable. Just thought I'd let you know."

"Got it, thanks. I'll be ready in a few."

Eren grabbed his clothes from his closet and walked into the bathroom. He brushed his teeth and jumped into the shower. Soon enough, the air around him was calescent as he turned the hot water knob all the way up. He closed his eyes and enjoyed the heat of the shower. He ran his hands through his hair, cleaning it of any grime of the previous day. Realizing he couldn't be late he turned the shower off and dried himself. He applied some of his favorite deodorant and slipped on his clothes. The weather was a little chilly today so he decided to wear a navy blue sweater and beige shorts. He lightly tousled his hair to make it set down as per usual, with a lock falling at his eyebrow.

He walked out to see Brock putting something on his desk. Eren went to his own desk to pack his bag. He stuffed in an extra notebook and his daily essentials.

"What do you have there Brocko?" he asked as he leaned to look.

"Just a picture of my family."

Brock had told him about his siblings last night, and Eren was really surprised when he got to know that he had nine younger siblings. That was a lot.

"What about you? No family photos?" Brock asked as he grabbed his own backpack.

Eren shook his head. "Not really a photo person, and admittedly I just don't like to," he lied. Truth was, he was just embarrassed about it.

"Well, let's go, we don't have too long before class starts."

The two boys grabbed their respective keys and left their room. The corridor was filled with students shuffling here to there. Some of them looked as if they were older, probably the upperclassmen.

They waved at Jenna as they left the lobby, Eren having to restrain Brock from making them late. The cafeteria wasn't far but Eren wanted to get rid of his drowsiness.

"Wanna run to the cafeteria Brock? I kinda want to wake up," Eren said.

"Sure why not. Guess it'll wake me up too."

The two of them sprinted to the building in sight, past the other students who were walking on the same path. It was just a little after half past seven and weather was breezy. The wind struck Eren's face and body with each stride, and he and Brock ran not too far from each other, careful not to run into anyone.

They reached the cafeteria without breaking a sweat. The smell of food wafted through the air and Eren felt his stomach growl. It smelled so _good_. The cafeteria was packed with students, but there weren't a lot of freshmen, mostly older students. There were no other familiar faces since Reyna and Terra had classes at nine, so the boys were alone. They grabbed trays from the table and stood in line waiting to get served.

Eren scanned the cafeteria. It was nothing out of the ordinary, but it was quite big and clean. Wooden benches were lined all across the hall, easily seating hundreds of students. Air conditioners were aligned on one wall across the entire length of that wall. The ceiling was arched and except for the metal framework, was made of glass, the sky visible and clear to the eye.

Eren took full servings of a stack of waffles with whip cream and maple syrup, a banana and a cup of coffee with extra sugar on the side. He looked around for a place to sit when a familiar face caught his eye.

He beckoned Brock to follow him as he walked up to that person.

"Mind if I sit here Lillianna?" he asked the girl.

"Uh sure yo- Eren! Hi!" she exclaimed once she saw who it was.

"Not interrupting anything am I?" Eren asked as he sat down across from her, Brock at his side.

"No not all, I was just eating before heading to the first class of today. Who's your friend here?" she asked.

Before Eren could introduce his roommate, Brock jumped right into it.

"My fair maiden, my name is Brock. You're as beautiful as a princess, can I be your prince?" he squealed as he grabbed her hand. Lillianna was taken aback by Brock's antics, and was speechless.

Brock was about to say more when a pokeball on his belt wobbled and he retracted his hand rapidly, and covered his sides and held his breath. The pokeball stopped wobbling in a few moments and he breathed a sigh of relief.

"Phew, safe." He said.

Eren first eyed the pokeball curiously, then Brock's nervous face.

"It's uh, nice to meet you Brock," Lillianna said, albeit a little hesitantly. Eren almost felt bad for Brock with his unsuccessful attempts.

Eren had already finished his banana and moved to his waffles.

"So where's Calloway?" he asked.

Lillianna's features donned an annoyed look at the mention of Calloway.

"He's late. As always. It was the same last year too," she huffed.

"You guys have the same classes today?" Eren asked, somehow already halfway through his waffles.

"Yeah, but frankly I don't think I care anyway. For all I know he'll probably rush to the classroom on his roller blades."

Eren remembered seeing the bag of skates yesterday in the stadium. Using skates as transport around the campus wasn't really a bad idea. But Eren preferred running so it didn't really matter.

Lillianna was finished with her breakfast and got up.

"Sorry, but I've got to run. Let's catch up later sometime, okay?" she said.

Eren nodded. "Yeah alright, say hi to Calloway for me, bye."

With that Brock and Eren were alone once again. Brock was still working on his waffles while Eren was done and was finishing up his coffee. He checked his phone for any notifications or messages. There were none except promotional emails. He opened Reyna's chat and sent her a message.

 _Hey, you awake yet? We're in the cafeteria right now, the food is great here 3._

He knew there wouldn't be an instantaneous reply, so he put his phone back into his pocket.

"Alright, I'm done, let's go," Brock said.

They put the trays on the cleaning counter in one of the corners and left the cafeteria. It was now only a few minutes left till it was eight, and more students had started pouring in.

"Alright Brocko, which direction are we supposed to go in?" Eren asked.

Brock took out his phone and opened up a map. Eren leaned in close and saw that it was a map of the campus, similar to the signboard outside the stadium.

"Survival class usually takes place in the Habitat Dome, which is, right about here."

He pointed to a big green circle, which was close to the stadium, but that was only on the virtual map. Physically it seemed a little far off.

"Well it looks like we have no choice but to run again. Ready Eren?"

Eren tightened his straps and shoelaces. "Always bud."

The two dashed off once again, Brock leading the way to the dome. Eren managed to remove his phone to check the time, ignoring Reyna's message. It was two minutes to eight.

"Let's step it up Brock."

Eren increased his pace and his strides became longer. He felt his feet hammer harder against the pavement with each step. They rounded a corner and saw the dome. Eren hadn't seen it yesterday because technically it was hidden by the stadium. But the dome was even larger than the stadium, and was made of clean transparent glass. He had no idea how thick, but it looked quite durable.

Up ahead, there were metal gates which were open, leading into the dome. Two guards were stationed at the entrance and students were showing them something, like a permit to enter.

Brock slowed down to a stop, and Eren followed suit.

The guards looked at the two boys. "IDs kids." One of them said.

The roommates flashed their IDs and the guards allowed them to enter. Brock's chest was heaving lightly. He looked over at Eren.

"Not even breathing hard are you?" Brock said, noticing that Eren wasn't out of breath despite the long run.

"I'm just used to it," Eren replied nonchalantly. Running every day had its perks.

There was no air conditioning in the dome but it wasn't even needed. There were circular parts cut out nearer to the bottom of the dome, and steel vents were put in their place. The dome was so huge he couldn't see where the other side was, but he noticed that the vents were placed at an even distance to each other, most likely encircling the entire lower part of the dome.

And speaking of the 'habitat' part, it was green as far as the eyes could see. There were a copious amount of trees, that too all diverse. There seemed to be no similar groups of trees next to each other.

"Hey whoa look up there! There's pokemon here too!" someone shouted from ahead of them.

Eren looked up to see little combee flying through the air, and below them, resting in the trees, burmys. The pokemon seemed curious about the new faces they were seeing and descended to a lower height. They circled around the students as if observing them. As a few combees passed Eren and Brock, the smell of honey seemed to drift through the air around them. It smelled really sweet and fresh.

Something clicked in Eren's mind.

"Wait, if pokemon like combee and burmy are here in these trees, does that mean that this place has different habitats and each habitat has its own different pokemon?" he said to no one in particular.

"No shit." A voice behind him said.

He turned to see yesterday's bad guy behind him, none other than Derek himself.

He was dressed in a similar fashion to Eren, a long sleeved t-shirt and shorts and a bag slung over his shoulder.

Eren gave him a look. "If it isn't Mr. Thirsty-for-battle. What brings you here?" he said, ignoring the reply he'd gotten.

"Same reason you're here, obviously." He stated. He began to walk ahead, seemingly not wanting a reply from Eren.

"Just don't thunderbolt someone today!" Eren called out, a grin on his face.

Derek scowled over his shoulder.

Eren chuckled to himself. This guy wasn't really as bad as he had thought yesterday. It was like taunting a male version of Reyna. Just that he much more aggressive, ignorant and silent. Reyna would probably kill him if he said that to her face.

"Who was that guy?" Brock asked, a curious look on his face.

Eren narrated yesterday's events to Brock as they walked to the area were told to go to. The guards had told them to go to Area P, and Eren had no idea where that was, so he just followed the students ahead of him. The cries of pokemon resonated throughout the area, but none of them were visible. Maybe they were a little precautious about new faces.

"The guy's restless as hell," Brock said once Eren was finished.

The students ahead stopped walking and so did Eren. He looked around. The surrounding vicinity was still green, although Eren was disappointed that they weren't in a different habitat yet. He had been hoping to see a marsh or a cold area. All the students had gathered in a clearing and were either sitting or standing. There weren't a lot, maybe about thirty freshmen.

The sound of two claps resonated through the area. Everyone became silent and looked around, wondering who had clapped.

"GOOD MORNING NEWBIES!" a loud voice bellowed.

Eren flinched at the booming voice, reaching for his belt and gripping his pokeball, having a good idea of who it was. The leaves in one of the trees rustled and a shadow jumped out into the center of clearing. Eren noted that the distance between the tree and center was very large, it was no joke.

"YOU READY TO SURVIVE?" the buff man shouted. It was the same teacher from the day before, the head of the Ignis dorm. Today he was dressed in a camouflage muscle shirt and a large pair of shorts. The students were frozen in shock, some even fell on their asses

Brock also had his hand on his belt, but hadn't brought the pokeball out.

The man looked around at the students. He jabbed a thick finger at Eren and Brock.

"You boys! Good reflexes!" he said.

He jabbed another finger at a girl with a rangy physique. Her honey blonde hair was up in a ponytail and she was in a similar stance to Eren and Brock.

"Good job young lady! But you're a little off balance!" he remarked.

The girl only blinked, relaxing her body a little.

He proceeded to point at some the people on the ground. "Not good newbies! You got to stay on your feet!"

He then turned to Derek, who had his manectric, Aiz, sparking in front of him.

"Hmm not bad young man, a little too hasty though. You can call your pokemon back." He said.

Derek did so, but still seemed wary of the man.

The tall man looked over all the students again.

"Well kiddos, my name is Jonathan Hawkcrest and I'm your survival teacher! You can call me Professor Hawkcrest, Mr. Hawkcrest, or just Professor."

Some of the students seemed to be a little at ease due to the fact that he was a teacher and not some psycho who jumps from trees.

"Sit down on your spots newbies, we're going to have a little chat."

The students sat down and looked expectantly at Hawkcrest.

Hawkcrest rubbed his hands together. "So, would anyone like to tell me why they chose the survival course?"

At first no one raised their hand, as if waiting for someone else to. Derek was the first to raise his hand.

"To be able to stay safe and strong in any situation, no matter what that situation is, and not feel useless if a situation occurs." He said.

Hawkcrest slowly nodded. "Okay nice, anyone else?"

This time Brock raised his hand.

"I'm aspiring to be a breeder and I think that I should also be able to survive in a situation where I won't be a setback so I can keep my pokemon safe from any harm."

"Well said boy." Hawkcrest gave a satisfactory nod, his blue gaze shifting to Eren.

"What about you boy?" he asked.

Eren felt uneasy as everyone's eyes were on him. He didn't really have a solid reason like Brock, even though he agreed with it.

"Uh, well I don't think my reason is as strong as my friend's here, even though I agree with him, but I chose this course because I want to learn new things and experience the thrill of adventuring. And I want to be a reliable and dependable person."

Eren heard a snicker, but he didn't know who it was. He felt a little awkward since no one said anything. He looked at Derek, expecting him to be the one who had snickered, but he was only met by a serious gaze.

"That's a good enough reason boy. You want to grow, and that's a good sign." Hawkcrest said with a smile on his face.

Eren gave him a nervous smile. He felt a pat on his back and looked at Brock, who gave him a thumbs up with his other hand.

"Listen up kiddos. Surviving is no joke. I've been adventuring all my life and there have been countless times I felt that I would die. A situation does not ask you to occur. It just happens, and when it does, you have to be on your feet, ready to get through it. At the time some incident happens, mental strength is also important. What's the use of learning how to survive when you lose your mind when you need it the most? You have to use your surroundings resourcefully and carefully. And that's not all, pokemon play an important factor in your survival as well."

He took a pause and made sure everyone was listening, before continuing.

"Your own pokemon and wild pokemon play a major role. Say you get attacked by a wild, scary pokemon. Sure, you can defend yourself by running here and there, but that doesn't last does it. You need your own pokemon to help fend off threats. Your pokemon can also be a very important resource. Take for example a fire type, which can help you light a fire when you need it."

A girl raised her hand. "Professor what about assignments and classwork?"

A majority of the class groaned at her words and her face flushed a bright red.

"Calm down people. And don't worry kiddo, I'm getting there." He said, crossing is arms, causing his muscles to bulge.

"Now see, my survival class, or Survival 101 as I like to call it, is a very practical class. We'll be conducting drills, battles, challenges and other various things. Even though it's mainly practical, I will have you take notes on the stuff I teach so that you remember it. You will use these notes as a reference to quizzes I conduct once in a while, practical or written. Your unit tests, which occur in between certain intervals, will be practical where we will be exploring the neighboring islands and I will give you a certain task to perform. I will explain the grading during that time. Understand?"

The class nodded furiously, elated at the fact that there were very minimal written things to do. The idea of exploring the neighboring islands sounded great to Eren.

"However, I expect you all to take this class seriously and not as child's play, because it won't be." Hawkcrest gave the students a stern look. "Also know this, you are prone to injuries in these classes, I hope you signed up for this with that fact in mind."

Eren knew that something like that was possible, but he didn't care much. It wasn't going to be anything life threatening so it was fine.

"All that aside, we'll have lots of fun in between too, so don't think of this class as a drag, cause it won't be." Hawkcrest said with a smile.

The students began conversing with each other, discussing things about the class.

"I think this class is going to be fun Eren, don't you think so?" Brock said enthusiastically.

"Yeah, I'm pretty excited honestly." He replied. He already liked this teacher, he seemed to be experienced too. He really wanted to be a reliable and dependable person, so people would take him more seriously instead of the goofball they believed him to be. Sure, he was laid back and carefree, but that didn't mean he didn't have a sense of responsibility. Maybe some people needed to realize that by now.

Eren was snapped out of his thoughts by Hawkcrest's voice.

"Now since today is the first class I haven't prepared like I always do. So today I'll be testing you guys in my own away. We'll be playing a game in Area P, which is the area we're in. no survival tests today, I'll be observing your individual mindsets and how you react to this game. Don't sweat it, it's nothing serious, but do your best. I'll explain the game to you."

He brought his fingers to his mouth and whistled. It was a shrill sound that rang through the area. Two assistants came out from the trees, as if they had waiting there the whole time. Both of them were holding a plastic bag each.

Hawkcrest let out another whistle in the opposite direction. The sound of buzzing wings could be heard coming from the direction in which Hawkcrest had whistled. The students were looking curiously at the bunch of trees to see what was making that sound. Suddenly a bipedal pokemon burst out from the tress and landed next to Hawkcrest, the buzzing even more prominent now.

"Oh look it's a scyther!" a student shouted.

Hawkcrest patted the scyther on the shoulder, careful not to touch its rapidly vibrating wings.

"Scyther here is one the local pokemon in the Habitat Dome, and acts as a protector of the other pokemon, especially the young ones. He's very dependable."

Scyther gave a nod of affirmation at the professor's words.

"So here's what the game is. All of you are going to get this ball, and with this ball you have to trap scyther." Hawkcrest said, removing a rugged black ball from one of the bags and holding it out.

Brock raised his hand. "But Professor, that's just a regular ball, how do we trap a pokemon like scyther?"

The others students nodded in agreement. Hawkcrest smiled.

"Watch this boy."

He threw the ball onto the ground and it suddenly expanded into a net made of metal wires. A chorus of 'ooo' came from the students. The assistants began distributing the balls to the freshmen. When Eren got his, he nearly dropped it. It was heavier than he had expected.

"There you go kiddos. This here is what's going to trap scyther. The main objective is to trap scyther using this net ball made by the young scientists we have here in Affinitive Academy. It won't harm scyther in any way so no need to worry about that. But there's a catch. If scyther manages to even touch you, then you're out of the game and will come back to this clearing. Be honest if you get touched, no cheating. Other assistants are stationed around and inside the perimeter so we'll know exactly what's happening. Now you can work in teams or go solo, it's your wish. Just remember, your time limit is forty five minutes. The game ends when scyther gets captured or every one of you loses. Now go and spread out into the forest, you have five minutes to conceal yourself. Oh and I almost forgot, no pokemon allowed, it's just you and your brain. And the game starts… now!"

The students began running in all the directions into the forest, leaving their bags in the clearing. Eren looked at Brock.

"We could work together, but I think it's best we do it solo. What do you say Brocko?" he asked.

Brock nodded in agreement. "I was thinking the same thing. Good luck Eren."

"Ditto, man."

The two roommates separated and ran in opposite directions to each other. Hawkcrest flashed Eren a thumbs up as he passed by. Eren wanted to win this game. He needed to make a mark, a mark that showed he was capable.

' _I'm going to win this game!_ ' he thought as he darted through the trees.

Hawkcrest smiled as he watched his students run off.

"Let's see what you're all capable of."

* * *

 **Sorry I was so late on this chapter, I was busy with stuff. Not really any action unlike the last chapter, but you can't always have action. I want to thank you all for the support so far, and the ones who review and critique especially, thank you all very much! I hope I can roll out the next chapter much sooner than this time.**

 **All the characters belong to their respective owners, and Brock belongs to Pokemon or Gamefreak, whichever really.**

 **-Fallen**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

* * *

Ten minutes had passed since the start of the game and Eren was sure he was well concealed in the verdure of Area P. He wasn't sure of his location, not a single person had passed by and there was no sign of scyther either. He took the black ball out of his pocket and examined it. It looked nothing out of the ordinary to him, just a thick ball with an irregular and rough surface. How it expanded into a net was beyond his imagination.

He let his feet dangle over the side of the branch he was sitting on. He needed to think of something before he could move ahead. This wasn't going to be easy at all, he knew that scythers were known to be swift and strong pokemon, so just throwing the ball would be a waste.

His ears perked as a scream echoed through the area. Looks like another person was out. Either scyther was really good or the other students were pretty bad. Probably the former option.

Eren sighed. He wasn't sure how to go about this, it was a really odd game. It would have made much more sense if the use of pokemon was allowed. Maybe working with Brock would have given him more ideas, but that wasn't an option anymore. And sitting in one place for the entire duration of the game wouldn't get him anywhere either.

Eren jumped down from the tree, landing a little awkwardly on the heels of his feet. He decided to head towards where the next scream would originate. Which meant he would most likely just wander until he heard another student get eliminated. He stayed on his guard as he walked through the forest, knowing that scyther could pop up in front of him suddenly and eliminate him.

He walked around aimlessly, the time passing without any scream being heard. Though he hoped someone would.

Eren checked his watch. Another ten minutes had passed, which meant less than half an hour was left now. A shiver ran down his spine all of a sudden, and the chill in the air wasn't responsible. He turned around. There was nothing behind him except for the bushes and trees. He held his breath and strained his ears. Silence.

He let out his breath. The game wasn't as exciting as he thought it would be, there was minimal action and mostly just wandering through Area P. Not to mention there were no pokemon with him, which made him feel a little lonely.

As he rounded another tree, he caught a glimpse of something sparkle from the corner of his eye. Eren quickly ducked to the ground, kneeling beside a bush. He peered over the corner of the bush to see what had caught his eye. From his position on the ground, nothing was visible, all kinds of greenery blocked his vision.

He slipped a hand into his pocket and pulled out his phone. He unlocked it with his fingerprint and turned the front camera on, and zoomed it to maximum. He slowly held his hand up as he put his back up against the bush, and looked at the screen. Luckily his phone had a good camera and everything was clear. He slowly kept turning the phone to completely scan his surroundings. He paused as a shadow moved, only to see that it was just a large branch. He sighed and lowered the phone, putting it back into his pocket.

He was slowly getting up when someone beside him shouted, startling him.

"I've got you now Scyth-Eh!"

Eren was halfway through turning around when he was struck in his side by...a head? Both he and the person lost their balance and crashed into the grass.

A grunt escaped his lips as his head hit the ground, his 'attackers' weight knocking the air out of him. He laid on his back, his head spinning. The people in Affinitive Academy definitely had something against him, no doubt about it.

"Ugh, who was that?" he croaked, bringing a hand to his forehead. He felt the weight on his body shift and fall off of him. Eren focused his eyes on the person, and saw that it was a girl, the same girl with the honey blonde hair whom he had seen in the clearing just before the game had started.

"I'm so sorry! I thought you were scyther and I jumped at you! Sorry!" she squeaked, her hands frantically moving in front of her face. "H-here, I'll help you sit up." She held out a small hand, which Eren grabbed a hold of and sat up.

He shook his hair clear of any grass. "I'm surprised you found any kind of similarities between me and a scyther."

The girl looked at the grass, her round cheeks burning a light red tinge. "Well I didn't exactly see you, just a shadow, which looked a lot like scyther's arm," she mumbled.

Eren realized that this girl must have seen his shadow when he was holding his phone up at an angle, and the folds of his sweatshirt sleeve probably didn't make his arm look normal either.

"Well I guess I can't completely blame you, but maybe double check next time?" Eren said, facing the girl. The girl bobbed her head up and down, her ponytailed hair moving strangely well along with her action. He noticed the freckles on her button nose and her round, black eyes.

"So have you actually seen scyther yet?"

The girl nodded. "I did, but before I could do anything it eliminated someone and ran off into this part of the forest. I tried following it but it was too fast and I lost it then."

"And then you found a human scyther and attempted to catch it." Eren deadpanned, standing up and dusting off his sweatshirt.

"S-sorry," the girl mumbled, not meeting Eren's gaze.

Eren smiled amusedly at the girl's apologetic behavior. If Reyna had been there at the moment she would have definitely rebuked him for teasing the girl. His mom probably would have too, speaking of whom, he had forgotten to call her the day before, he was sure to hear something from her side as well…

He shook his head. This wasn't the time to think about that, he was in a game.

"Well, don't dwell on that matter, let's try to find scyther together," Eren suggested. "What do you say?"

The girl looked up curiously at Eren. "Together?" she said, uncertainty in her voice. Eren nodded.

"Yeah why not, it would be better if we tried to trap scyther as a team, the odds are better. Obviously though, there's no guarantee that we can really do anything."

The girl pondered over the offer for a few seconds before standing up and extending her hand out to Eren. "Alright, let's work together to win!" she exclaimed.

"Deal!" Eren said as she shook her hand. "I'm Eren by the way."

"I'm Tanya." The girl said, giving him a small smile. The two freshman began heading in the direction which Tanya pointed out, stating that scyther had most probably gone in that direction. Eren glanced at his watch. Just under twenty minutes left. In the end he probably was better off working with another person.

As Tanya tried to remember the exact location where she had last seen scyther, Eren quickly glanced over the girl. Her clothes were baggy and loosely covered her thin body. She wore grey sweatpants and had a faded red, almost pink jacket slipped on over a tee which wasn't visible from the black side. For some reason her clothes looked slightly worn out and had minuscule holes running along erratic lengths on the fabric, but they weren't exactly tattered.

As Eren thought of the possibilities why the holes were present, he nearly crashed into Tanya as she came to an abrupt stop.

"Something wro-"

"Shh!" she harshly whispered.

Eren was silenced by Tanya's hand in front his mouth. She turned to him with a finger on her lip.

"Did you hear that?" she whispered, her eyes darting from side to side. Eren shook his head. He strained his ears in an attempt to try to listen to what Tanya was talking about. But except for the slight rustling of the leaves on the trees, he couldn't hear anything. He was about to ask Tanya what exactly she had heard when another sound reached his ears. Buzzing. The buzzing of _wings_.

His gaze met Tanya's. Both of them were thinking the same thing. Scyther. Eren slowly turned his head up to look at the looming branches, but there was nothing in sight. They didn't have any time to formulate a plan of any kind, what were they going to do? He hadn't really even expected to find scyther, much less scyther find them.

"It doesn't look like we can actually work out a plan right now, so maybe it's best if we hide for the moment," Eren said, keeping an eye out behind Tanya's back in case scyther decided to play peek-a-boo.

"I guess we have no choice then." Tanya pointed to the row of bushes behind her. "I'll hide there and you take the opposite side. Maybe we can somehow get scyther into the net."

"Alright, make sure to play safe." Eren gave Tanya a brisk nod before sprinting to the bushes behind him, and laid stomach down, elbows propped up on the grass. He peered through a gap between the twigs to see that Tanya had hidden herself and there was nothing else to be seen.

Once again the sound of buzzing reached his ears, this time resonating throughout the entire area. The branches overhead cracked and Eren gulped, silently hoping he hadn't been found. Luckily he hadn't, but the buzzing had grown even stronger and a figure jumped down into the clearing, cracking the ground beneath its feet. It was undoubtedly scyther, but something made Eren feel very uneasy the moment he saw the bipedal bug type. A shiver ran down his spine, as if there was a chill in the air.

The beating of scyther's wings was so powerful that Eren could feel the air vibrating around him. Something was different, but he just couldn't put a finger on what it was. A low snarl emanated from the bug pokemon's throat. It roared and swung its arms around, black energy in the form of crescents flying out in centrifugal motion, and cutting through the air and any dangling branches. A few of the attacks were lower than Eren liked and he was glad he wasn't sitting up.

Scyther swung its head around, looking almost disappointed that it hadn't hit anything, but that quickly changed to more rage. By the looks of it, neither Eren nor Tanya had been found out, yet. Pokemon were smart creatures, and Eren knew that it wouldn't be too long before an attack would be aimed at them.

But once again, Eren felt that something was different, was this really the same scyther from half an hour ago? He pushed his head a little deeper into the leaves and twigs, trying to get a better view without being discovered. He paused when scyther's head turned to look at the bush he was hiding behind, only to sigh in relief when it looked away.

Now the question was how he could throw the ball, without making a sound and before scyther fished him out. The bipedal bug let out another barrage of attacks around itself and Eren was lucky enough none of them were even close to him, but one of them slashed too close for comfort next to the bush Tanya was behind and she let out a small shriek, which did not go unheard and scyther stopped for a moment, before stalking towards where Tanya was.

"Shit," Eren murmured, his brain rushing through the things that he could do to avoid scyther reaching the bush. At that time, scyther's wings had stopped buzzing and Eren caught a glimpse of them. His eyes widened when he saw that the wings were ripped at many places. So he was right. This was a different scyther! But was it a part of the habitat? Or did it belong to someone?

As these questions played in his head, scyther inched closer and closer to where Tanya was, and she had no way to run away without being found. Seeing no other option to help her, Eren slid back and stood up from his own hiding spot, and took aim at scyther's back.

' _Here goes nothing,'_ he thought. He chucked the ball with his right hand, with enough force as he would throw a baseball. The ball flew straight at scyther, perfectly aimed. Just as it was about to hit though, scyther whirled around, its scythe-arm cutting through the ball as if it was butter. The two halves fell to the ground. That shifted scyther's attention to Eren, and it was visibly glowering at him. Eren gulped.

"Well shit."

The bug type pokemon let out a bloodcurdling snarl and it leaped towards Eren. Well, _disappeared_ was the right word because as soon as Eren blinked scyther was no longer in his vision. The next moment Eren was clutching his left arm as scyther's attack ripped through his sweatshirt and cut his arm.

"Gah!" he grunted as he fell to the ground, blood soaking his sleeve. He looked up to see scyther's arm stuck in the trunk of a tree. It growled and pulled it back out, shredding the bark of the tree.

This scyther up close looked quite menacing, it was bigger and bulkier than the one that Hawkcrest had called, and definitely not as nice apparently. It seemed furious for some reason, and in pain. He wondered who it belonged to.

"Eren look out!" Tanya, who had emerged from her hiding spot, cried, breaking him out of his momentary trance. He rolled out of the way as another cut was aimed at him, slicing the grass where he was barely a second ago. He pushed himself up, wincing as his left arm felt hot with the blood still flowing, albeit lesser now. He staggered into the clearing as fast as he could. Tanya ran up to him.

"Oh my god you're hurt!" she said, as she saw his arm. Eren looked to see if the bug type had come to attack again, and was momentarily relieved to see it was distracted. With his right hand he pulled out his phone, unlocked it, and handed it to Tanya.

"Call the contact named Brock and tell him to find Professor Hawkcrest as soon as he can. Tell him that there's another scyther loose here and it's not a friendly one." Eren said, glancing between Tanya and the angry pokemon. "Hurry!"

"But what about you?" Tanya asked, pointing at his soaked sleeve. "You're hurt!"

"I'll try to fend it off as much as I can while you call Brock. It won't be enough and I'll need your help if I want to do anything. There's no guarantee even the both of us together can do anything against a strong opponent like that without our own pokemon."

Eren rolled his sleeves up and tightened the left one especially, to try and stop the blood. He looked around on the ground and picked up a branch that was thicker than the average metal rod.

"Stay back and call him, I don't want you getting hurt. I got lucky, it won't always be like that." He told Tanya, who seemed ready to argue with him, but kept quiet.

"Alright I'll call him," she finally decided. She pressed the contact and brought the phone up to her ear.

Eren turned to look at scyther, who was looking intently back at him, wings fluttering erratically and impatiently. Eren had to just act as a decoy until help showed up, which was also not going to be easy. He wiped the sweat and grass from his forehead with his right arm. He tested his left arm. He could move it, but it was throbbing a lot.

"Well big guy, let's play tag, catch me if you can!" Eren shouted, following up with a sharp whistle. That seemed to stir scyther up, and it snarled and lunged towards him. Eren did what he could do best at the moment. Run.

He dashed off into the part of the forest opposite of where Tanya was, hoping to lead scyther away from her as she called for help. Eren swerved through the trees without looking back to see if he was being followed, there was no need, he could hear fallen branches crunching loudly as scyther gained on him quickly. He hoped help came quickly, he wasn't going to last long against a pokemon of this much caliber.

Eren rounded a corner suddenly, in an attempt to slightly throw scyther off, but came face to face against another tree, which was the biggest he had seen in Area P so far. He turned, but his momentum made him stumble and he fell down, his back hitting the trunk. He gasped as the wind get knocked out of his chest.

"Scyther!"

The bug type pokemon cried out, bringiing its arm down in a clean arc, and Eren moved out of the way just in time. The force of the attack lodged the scythe-arm in the bark of the tree and scyther growled in pain. Eren scooted away as quickly as possible, trying to catch his breath. The branch had fallen out of his hand when he fell, and now he was empty handed. The scyther began groaning in agony and jerked its head back and forth violently, swinging its free arm around haphazardly.

Eren looked on, confused at the bug type's antics.

"Who's your trainer?' he called out, hoping to get an answer in one way or another. But scyther didn't seem to have heard what he said, instead falling to its knees as it freed its arm. Eren inched closer to scyther. Maybe he had a chance of soothing him down, he had to try in the very least.

"Are you okay?" he gently asked scyther from a safe distance. Scyther was now breathing hard, its body heaving with each breath it took. He winced when he saw that the scars on its body were etched a deep green compared to its light green skin, and caught the sun's rays as they permeated through the branches and leaves of the trees, and its wings looked as thin as membranous material. But it didn't respond to Eren's words in any way.

Eren reached out with his hand, looking to pat its head. As he expected, scyther reeled back, bristling with caution and alarm in its eyes. Eren put his hands behind his head, in an attempt to make scyther realize he didn't mean any harm. But it didn't work, and scyther moved in to attack once again, its scythe glowing black as it prepared another night slash.

Eren took off without so much as a glance behind him, an idea finally forming in his head. He was going to go back to where Tanya was. Naturally, scyther followed after him, bounding through the thick roots on the ground. By now Eren was sure he would've been cut down, but scyther's speed had significantly dropped since its first attack, a good thing for Eren.

But Eren was getting tired too, he was used to running, but an intense situation like this only made him tire faster. He hoped his plan would work, then he could sit in peace.

He somehow made his way back to the clearing, where he saw Tanya restlessly pacing on the other side. She noticed him as he came out through the trees, and started to run towards him.

"They're almost here!" she shouted.

"Wait stop there! Don't come closer!" he yelled back, and she skidded to a stop suddenly, a confused look on her face. Scyther emerged from the trees behind Eren and gained on him quickly. Eren felt the wind hit his neck as scyther slashed at him from behind, dangerously close.

"Throw the black ball at me!" he instructed Tanya.

"B-but why?" She asked, a hand on the pocket of her sweatpants.

"No time! Just do it! Throw it as hard as you can!"

"Fine!" Tanya brought the black ball out of her pocket and took aim, her hand wavering slightly, before chucking it straight at Eren. It was perfect, just how he had wanted her to throw it. He barely dodged another deadly strike from scyther, who was literally on his back by now, as he was eyeing the incoming ball.

' _Come on, gotta wait for it…now!_ '

As the ball was about a couple feet away from his face, he quickly dived to the ground, the ball finding its mark in scyther instead of him. As they had seen before the game started, as soon as the ball hit scyther's body, it instantaneously expanded into a net and encompassed the bug type pokemon.

"Scyther!?" It cried out in surprise as in was blown away by the expanding net's momentum, and fell to the ground. Eren laid still on the ground, panting. He pumped his left fist in the air in victory, before the throbbing made him let it fall back down. He craned his head to see that scyther was struggling in the net, but it wasn't able to cut through the net at all, it was unexpectedly durable.

Eren closed his eyes and took deeper breaths, his pounding heart slowly beating at its usual pace again.

"You okay?" Tanya asked from beside him. He opened his eyes to see her seated next to him a hand over a knee while the other was on the ground as support.

"Yeah, nice throw there," he said, sitting up again.

"Risky move you played there, I feel like I didn't help you at all," she replied, a frown on her face.

Eren waved his hand at the remark. "Nonsense, if you weren't here there was no way I could have stalled scyther for this long, not to mention capture it in the net. I should be thanking you," he said.

"Glad I could help, but if this was the same scyther we would have won the game," Tanya mused aloud. She stood up and walked towards where scyther was lying under the net. It had stopped wriggling around and just stared blankly up at the sky, unmoving.

"I wonder whose scyther this is," Tanya said, observing the pokemon at her feet.

"I wish I knew too, it looked like it was in a lot of pain, even when it attacked me, and not exactly physical pain, I think it was more of mental pain or stress." Eren moved his left sleeve above his elbow to prevent it from brushing against the cut. "How long did Brock say he would take?"

"He said he hadn't wandered too far from the starting point, so it wouldn't take him long to contact the Professor. I'm assuming they should be here soon." She answered. "Oh and here's your phone."

She brought the phone out of her pocket and handed to him. Eren reached out with his left hand to grab it. "Doesn't it hurt?" Tanya asked, glancing over the dried blood and dirt that coated his arm.

"I'm starting to feel it now, it stings a lot, but it doesn't look like scyther cut in too deep, I got lucky," he said, stopping as he saw flash of white across the black screen.

He turned around and saw a man standing in the trees behind the two of them, wearing an assistants white lab coat. But on closer inspection, it was more like a trench coat instead of a lab coat. The man was tall, but his wide frame made him look even bigger then he already was. His face was hidden by a slightly tipped wide hat, which shadowed out his features. As strange as he seemed, Eren was glad someone had found them.

"Hey!" he called out, standing up and waving his hand above his head. "We're lucky you got here soon, is Professor Hawkcrest with you?"

The man had heard what he said, but responded unexpectedly to it. He turned around and walked back into the forest, completely ignoring Eren. His white clothes soon disappeared amidst the shadows of the forest.

Eren scowled in his direction. "What's his problem?" he mumbled. He didn't seem like an assistive assistant at all. Was he even an assistant?

"Eren! You alright?" a voice shouted. Eren tore his gaze from the shroud of trees and branches to the familiar faces of Brock and Hawkcest coming in through the other side of the trees. "Yeah, perfect," he replied, standing next to Tanya. Two more assistants appeared from behind Hawkcrest as he walked up to Eren.

"Good to see you're okay son," Hawkcrest looked at his arm. "Most of you at least." Eren grinned and rubbed the back of his head. He narrated the events that had happened since he and Tanya had stopped in the clearing, Tanya piping in once in a while to tell it from her point of view. Once Eren was done, Hawkcrest looked down at scyther, who was still unmoving. He squatted and examined the body of the bug type. Eren and Tanya stepped out of the way as Hawkcrest circled around, his stoic eyes absorbing all the details of the pokemon in his vision.

Brock nudged Eren from behind. "Glad to see you're okay, buddy."

"Thanks, glad to be alive I'd say." He directed his attention to teacher, "What do you think, Professor?"

Hawkcrest looked up from his examination to the three students. "No doubt that this scyther is different from the one residing in the Habitat Dome. In fact, I haven't seen a scyther like this anywhere on campus in the recent years. It's very suspicious indeed. And you mentioned that it looked like it was mentally unstable?"

Eren nodded. "It didn't seem to know what it was doing when it attacked me, I'm sure it could've cut my arm off easily, if it wanted to. And it was crying out and shaking its head a lot, it positively looked as if it was in pain. And actually if you don't mind, I have a selfish request, sir."

"Hmm?"

"I was hoping you could take scyther to the pokemon center and treat it. I think it was somehow just forced to dance to someone's tunes, believe me, it's innocent."

Eren's words seemed to linger as all the pair of eyes in the clearing went to look at scyther. Hawkcrest put his arm on Eren's shoulder and slightly squeezed it. "I'll take your word for it young man, we'll take scyther to the pokemon center and get it all healed."

"Thank you Professor."

Hawkcrest gestured to the two assistants to carry scyther off, which wasn't as much work since scyther wasn't resisting in any manner. They carefully grabbed the ends of the net and walked off. Eren didn't take his eyes off the bug pokemon until it had left his sight.

"Now let's get back to the situation at hand." Hawcrest looked over the three students. "The game is going to end in a few minutes and no one has managed to capture scyther, or even come close according to the assistants stationed around the area. For now, Eren I'd like you to go the clinic we have here on campus and get patched up. It's not the biggest building but you'll find it on the other side of the Ignus dorm. Tanya, since you're not injured, and Brock, I'd like you to come with me for the remaining part of the class."

Eren decided against arguing with Hawkcrest to let him stay too, the burly teacher wouldn't listen to him anyway. It was better to just listen to his advice.

"I'm very impressed with the fact you both actually managed to capture a scyther even stronger than the one in the Dome, you seem to be quick on your feet and minds. As you can see, anything can happen, so this is the stuff I'll be preparing you for." Hawkcrest frowned and sighed. "Though I suppose as a teacher I should make sure nothing like this should happen. You have my apologies Eren and Tanya."

Tanya shook her head as she beamed at the praise she had gotten. "It's not your fault Professor, we were just unlucky." Eren nodded in agreement.

"I'll make sure it doesn't happen next time, until next class Eren." Hawkcrest beckoned Tanya and Brock to follow him as he left the clearing. Brock turned to Eren.

"I'll meet you up at the cafeteria after class ends. And I'll get your backpack too, don't worry."

"Thanks a lot buddy. See you soon Tanya, it was nice to meet you. I owe you one!"

Tanya smiled. "It was nice to meet you too Eren, see you soon. And take care of your hand too."

* * *

Outside the Dome, Eren could see more students than he had even yesterday. Groups of girls and boys walked past him as he casually strolled to the clinic. He had asked for directions around and one of the students told him that he could use the inbuilt map in the school's app. It was pretty convenient really. He was near the Ignis dorm by now, and according to the map, the clinic wasn't too far off. But it would prove a little far for the students of the Aqua dorm as they were on the opposite side of the main road. Thinking of the Aqua dorm reminded him of Adelaide. He hadn't heard from her since the morning. Maybe he would text her some time later…

A notification popped up at the top of his screen, a text from Reyna. He first saw the reply to his text about the cafeteria food.

 _Yeah yeah, we know you love the food, it's obvious._

The other message was the recent one.

 _Where are you? We've got a small break right now, this class is fun so far honestly._

Eren sharply exhaled through his nose, he never understood how a class like Pokemon _History_ could be fun to someone. It could be interesting admittedly, but fun didn't seem to mix well. He typed in his reply with his right hand.

 _Only you would think it's 'fun'. And to answer your question, I'm on my way to the Clinic because some stuff happened in the past twenty minutes of class. I'm feeling pretty good about this first year._

He put the phone back into his pocket and looked up at the building in front of him. It wasn't very large, at least compared to the other buildings he had seen so far. It was only about three stories high, and he couldn't see how long it was from the frontal view he had. He walked up the steps and through the automatic glass doors. The smell of fresh antibiotics and various other medicine that came with the air conditioning made him wrinkle his nose in disgust. He had never found the smells that wafted through hospitals and clinics very appealing.

His phone vibrated in his pocket, probably a reply from Reyna. Eren didn't dare reply, he was sure there would be a string of, 'How stupid and careless are you!' messages, or even 'Why are you always getting injured for one reason or another!'

It wasn't like he did it on purpose, at least not this time. Eren considered himself as someone who never really cared for the consequences of any action he took. It was luck which would decide that for him, and so far, he wasn't really lucky in the 'no injury' department.

The Clinic was quiet enough that you could clear your throat and all other heads would look up at you. He walked up to the main reception area, where a woman sat, filling out forms in the blink of an eye.

"Uh, excuse me," he whispered, not wanting to disrupt the silence. The woman looked up at him, her pen still moving as she wrote a few words, before putting the pen down.

"Yes?"

"I'd like to get my arm checked up, or bandaged or whatever," he said, holding up his left arm for the woman to see. The blood had dried completely by now and was a dull red, black in some places closer to the cut. There was also dirt and bits of grass stuck to the dry blood.

The lady eyed the arm and sighed. "I haven't seen you around, which means you're probably a first year. I don't think coming to the clinic on your first day of the school year is a nice way to start the year kid."

"My luck doesn't agree with you I guess."

The lady chuckled. "Alright, follow me. Let's get your arm checked." She stood up from her comfortable looking chair and walked to where the hallway started. Eren followed her as she led him through the hall, which was definitely longer then he had expected. The area was very clean and everything looked symmetrically satisfying. The doors, blinds and tiles, everything was combined properly for each room.

The lady stopped at a door which was labeled 109, and opened it. She gestured towards the cot in the middle and Eren proceeded to plop down on it. It was soft, just like the bed back at the dorm.

"Wait here while I call Nurse Thorne," the lady said as she closed the door behind her. Eren sat on the bed in silence, taking in the contents of the room. It was a very orderly room, as expected of a medical facility. Next to the cot there was a steel trolley on which the surgical instruments were arranged in descending order of size, along with a few cotton swabs. A trash can sat at the corner of the room right next to an open door which led to the bathroom. He felt the cot vibrate suddenly as his phone rang. He removed it from the pocket of his shorts and pursed his lips as he saw the caller. He took a deep breath and tapped on the green circle.

"Hey mom, what are you doing?" he said nervously, knowing very well what she would say next.

"Hey mom. Is that all you have to say young man? I told you to call me the moment you reached Quake Island, does that mean you haven't gotten there yet? That's some awfully slow transportation, I don't remember it being this slow." His mother said, a sharp edge in her voice.

Eren winced at her tone and mentally cursed himself for forgetting to call her. It wasn't the first time this had happened, but he never got used to the way his mom scolded him. Though he supposed he couldn't blame her.

"No it was fast, I uh, forgot to call you. Everything's fine, my roommate is cool, I've already made a few other friends too. It's all good mom." He reassured her, careful not to mention anything about what had recently happened.

"You better watch out if you 'forget' again Eren. It's nice to see that you've adapted to your new home so fast, and how's Reyna?"

"Same as ever mom."

His mother's laughter rang through the phone. "Make sure to take care of each other and tell her I said hi. Study hard Eren, but remember to enjoy yourself. And don't forget to call your mother once in a while, she worries about you, okay?"

Eren smiled. "Yeah, she worries too much honestly. I'll call you later, class is starting," he lied.

"Bye dear, I love you."

"Love you too mom."

The door to the room opened not a second after he hung up and a woman walked in. She was a little on the shorter side, and wore a white coat with the label 'Nurse' on the breast pocket. Her black hair was tied in a messy bun and she had a clipboard in her hand and a pencil over her ear.

"I didn't expect a visitor in my clinic so soon, that too a freshman. What made you be the first?" she said, amusement in her voice.

"Some stuff happened in Professor Hawkcrest's class today, and so I became the first patient of this school year," Eren replied as he held his arm out for Nurse Thorne to observe. She let out a sigh as she rolled up his sleeve and dabbed at the wound with a wet cloth. Her nimble hand quickly cleaned the dried blood and dirt surrounding the cut.

"Jonathan sends me most of the patients each year, his courses are honestly so reckless sometimes. When he takes his semester examinations we usually have to send extra nurses to the island so that they can help the students."

Eren winced as she dabbed over the clean cut with some disinfectant. She then proceeded to wrap the cut with some bandages and made a knot to make sure it didn't slip. Eren tested his arm, moving it back and forth. It was tight enough to stay put and at the same time, not hinder movement.

"Thank you Nurse Thorne."

The nurse waved her arm in front of her face. "It's my job to make sure you kids are safe. Would you mind telling me how this happened though? As far as I remember even in the first class Jonathan doesn't tell the students to do anything extreme."

"Honestly I'd rather not say. Maybe if you meet Professor Hawkcrest, he'll tell you," Eren said, not wanting to tell her how he'd nearly been mauled by a random scyther. Maybe she'd find out once scyther was treated at the Pokemon Center.

"Alright, if you don't want to that's fine. The cut wasn't very deep so it'll heal completely in about two weeks time, our medicine is advanced nowadays, so it's more effective too. Just make sure not to overexert your left arm, and if the cut starts bleeding a lot again, I'll fix it up for you."

Eren stood up from the cot and stretched his arm slowly. "Thanks again Nurse Thorne." He walked out the door, "Bye."

Nurse Thorne waved at him as he strolled down the corridor to the exit. He stopped along the way at the reception desk to sign a form which had details about his checkup. After filling the main details he left the Clinic and headed back to the dorms. There was still some time before Brock would come with his backpack, so he decided to change his ripped sweater for another one.

* * *

Eren sat in the garden next to the Ignis dorm, sipping the chilled apple juice he had bought from a vendor, as he watched the other students walk by. Brock had called him and told him to wait near the dorm so it would be easier to find him. In the time that he had waited, Eren had researched the campus more properly, memorizing the roads to each of the buildings. The southern part of the campus was where the shops and markets were situated. Apparently even people residing nearby Quake Island could stop by and shop in Southern Square. Close to Southern Square was the Affinitive Academy Bank, where the students could manage their money.

The Champion's Stadium (the one from yesterday) and the Habitat Dome were near the heart of the Island. He hadn't completely seen the maps for the eastern and western parts of the island, but he knew that they held docks, where boats could leave for the neighboring islands. The neighboring islands intrigued him a lot, maybe he would ask someone else if they knew more about them.

A few minutes later, Brock showed up with his backpack and two of them sat in the garden, basking in the sun and the cool air. Brock told him about what had happened after he had left, stating that no one had been able to capture scyther but a few people had come close. Hawkcrest had told the students about the other scyther and told them to be careful regarding such situations.

The time passed quickly as they played a few battle simulations as well as breeding simulations on their phones, each of them helping the other understand things better. It was nearly a quarter past eleven by now, so they both set off for the cafeteria. It was too early for lunch, but the cafeteria was always open for students to have as a study place or a place for meetings.

Seated in one of the middle benches, Reyna spotted the two of them before they could spot her. She glared at him as he and Brock walked towards the bench, Terra waving enthusiastically from beside her.

"So you'll just ignore all my texts after casually saying that you're headed to the Clinic? And how can you be so careless and stupid?" she hissed as he sat down across from her. Eren gave himself a mental pat on the back for his 'divination'.

"Relax, it wasn't anything major. Just a cut," he said.

"A big cut," Brock piped in, pointing to Eren's left arm. Eren passed him a look and he shrugged. Eren quickly narrated the events of Survival class to Terra and Reyna, both intently listening to his words. When he had finished, Terra spoke up first.

"I'm glad you're okay, that sounded like a really bad situation. I have no idea whose scyther that could've been, I don't know anyone here besides you guys."

"I'll check up on in later after it's been treated, to see if it remembers anything. Oh and my mom said hi Reyna," Eren said.

"I doubt you told her about your arm, though I guess it's better if you didn't. I'm glad you're okay too."

"So what do you guys want to do now? Have lunch here or go south and have lunch there?" Brock asked. The other three spent a moment in silence, thinking about what to do. Reyna voiced her opinion first.

"Lunch won't be served for an hour at least, so why don't we explore the square in the remaining time and then enjoy lunch afterwards. We have the entire day to ourselves so let's make the best of it."

The other three slowly nodded in agreement, it sounded like a good idea. Someone caught Eren's eye as he looked around. "I think we might have someone else who could join us," he said, getting up from his seat and walking further down their table.

He peered over the person's shoulder after he stopped behind her. "Morning Adelaide, what are you doing?" he asked, focusing on the screen of the laptop she was typing furiously on. She had probably not heard what he had said, because she didn't stop typing. He tapped her on the shoulder.

"What are you writing?" he asked again, hoping to get a response this time.

Adelaide's hand whipped out and she shut the laptop in a flash, before turning around, flustered.

"Wha? Don't look! Oh, it's just you Eren," she exclaimed, following up with a sigh of relief. Eren noticed that she was wearing casual clothes, at least probably by her standards. She was wearing a white blouse and had a pleated skirt on, despite the chill outside. She maintained her looks positively well, putting effort into looking good.

"Yeah, calm down it's just me, morning," he pointed to the laptop, "What were you writing there?"

"Uh well I'd rather not say honestly… don't feel bad! It's that I don't share or tell anyone what I write about," she replied apologetically. Eren waved her off.

"Alright I won't pry for details. Say, we were just planning to head on down to Southern Square, want to come with us?" he asked, jerking a thumb back to where the other three were sitting. Reyna enthusiastically waved at Adelaide, who happily waved back.

"You've already made new friends so quickly Eren, I'm kind of jealous."

"I'm sure you've made a lot of friends too, so what do you say, want to hang out with us?"

Adelaide didn't ponder on the suggestion and immediately nodded her affirmation. She properly shut her laptop down and followed Eren back to their seat. She sat down in between him and Brock.

"Hi Reyna, good to see you again!" she piped. Reyna smiled in reply.

"Terra, Brock, this Adelaide. We met her yesterday before the exhibition battle." She introduced.

Terra put a hand on her chin. "Oh I know Adelaide, we're in the same appeal class, I didn't get to talk to you in class, but it's nice to meet you formally, I'm Terra."

Eren clapped his hands. "Well, now that we're done with introductions, how about we get going?"

* * *

They were lucky that there were transportation options on the campus itself, it took less time to move around the island. The local tram made rounds of the entire island. With small stations at each significant place. By foot Southern Square was about half an hour away, but the tram could get them there in a little less than ten minutes. Eren had to reiterate earlier events when Adelaide asked about his arm, and then conversed with her and Terra on the previous days exhibition match. She had been rooting for Jake because she considered him very cool, which amused Eren.

It wasn't long before they were standing inside the open gates of Southern Square, which was bigger than Eren had expected. Shops and cafes stood next to each other, each filled with customers who weren't only students. It looked it was a hangout for other people too. Kids ran through the main square while some marveled at street magicians who were performing. It was a very lively place and it made Eren feel happy on the inside.

"So who wants to go where?" Reyna asked. Terra was the first to raise her hand, excitement plastered on her face.

"Ooh ooh! I've heard there's this place that sells some great ice cream and I want to check it out!" she squealed. Everyone burst out laughing at her excitement, and her cheeks flushed a light pink as she pouted.

"I'll come with you then, I'm always down to eat," Eren flashed Terra a thumbs up, "What about the rest of you?"

"I think I'll hit the market area for groceries, we'll need some ingredients in the dorm room to make extra food, we can't always go to the cafeteria, it'd be a waste of time sometimes." Brock said, brandishing a list from his pocket.

"Seriously, you can cook too?" Eren patted him on the back, "You're a valuable roommate my friend."

"Guess we'll see after I make something for you guys."

Adelaide was quick to latch onto Reyna's arm. "I'm taking Reyna to some clothing stores, no buts!" she said, jabbing a finger under Reyna's chin, who was about to protest. She sighed in defeat.

"Alright, if you insist."

"Well then let's meet in an hour or something," Eren decided. "The central fountain or this place is good enough." The others nodded in affirmation.

After they parted, Eren walked beside Terra, marveling at how lively the square was, even though the sun was barely at its highest point. There were quite a few students too, which wasn't a surprise since it was a student hotspot. A few of them even had their pokemon , which made Eren want to call out his. The academy had set a rule which stated that only pokemon smaller than the trainer could be kept outside their ball. Other larger pokemon could only be released at the instructions of a teacher or a place where pokemon could roam freely, like a stadium. Eren was suddenly grateful that Autumns hadn't told him for releasing Delta yesterday, who was definitely bigger than him.

"Want to release our pokemon?" he asked Terra. He was sure his pokemon wanted to walk under the sun after a while.

"Great idea! Aquater would love it." She tossed a pokeball from the side of her denim overalls. "Come on out Aquater!" A momentary flash of light presented them with a slender pokemon with an inflatable tube around its neck.

"Bui!" it cried out as it stretched its limbs. Terra bent down and patted her pokemon on the head, who seemed to enjoy it.

"Oooh a buizel, how cool!" Eren said, extending a hand forward. Aquater allowed it and Eren ran his fingers just above the inflatable tube. Eren smiled as Aquater's tail flapped around, a sign that he enjoyed it. "Aww Aquater loves it, how'd you know where he likes to be scratched?" Terra asked, putting the pokeball back.

"I practically spent my entire spare time with the pokemon in the daycare that Reyna's parents run. I've picked up a few things related to certain pokemon I guess."

"That sounds so fun. Show me your pokemon, I'm interested to see what kind of pokemon you have."

Eren had already decided which pokemon he wanted out, since Delta was definitely out of the question. "I'm warning you, he'll jump on you so be careful. Come out, Laxer!" The bright light from the pokeball materialized in to a round figure. His pokemon shook its head and looked around, before hugging Eren's legs with a happy cry. He bent down and hugged Laxer.

"It's nice to see you too buddy," he chuckled as Laxer's ears tickled his face.

"Aww your munchlax is so cute!" Terra cooed. Eren laughed as Laxer let go of him and hugged onto Terra's legs, causing her to nearly trip. "And so friendly!" she added as she returned the hug.

"He's always been like that, he makes new friends pretty fast. Now let's go get some ice cream!" Eren pumped his fist in the air. Terra laughed at his antics, but she looked even more eager than him.

They walked on, talking more about the exhibition battle and the academy. Eren found chatting with Terra pleasing, she was simple and down to earth, and so far he enjoyed being with her. He smiled to himself when he imagined Reyna's situation with Adelaide dragging her around. In a short time that he had got to know her, he had the feeling that Adelaide was into the fashion industry. On the other hand Reyna had never really cared much about that kind of stuff, so it would've been a sight to see her being dragged around like that.

Aquater and Laxer followed their trainers and communicated in their local tongues, occasionally playing small rounds of tag and just running around through their trainers' feet. It wasn't long before they reached their destination. Eren looked up at the sign, which said 'Cream Works' and followed Terra inside. The shop wasn't the largest, nor the most crowded, but it had a soothing atmosphere. The few other students sat on the tables, eating ice cream or sipping some cold beverage. It was a pokemon friendly café by the looks of it, since they could be seen wandering about.

After a quick look at the menu, Eren handed Terra the money for his order along with some special ice cream for Laxer, and she went to order on the counter. Eren found a seat in the middle and sat down, Aquater and Laxer following suit. As he waited for Terra to come back, he played around with the two pokemon who seemed to enjoy the atmosphere too.

"Are both of these your pokemon?" a voice next to him said. He turned to see a girl sitting at the adjacent table, intently staring at the two pokemon with him. For a moment Eren was taken aback by her mesmerizing grey eyes. She had flowing black hair which had an eye-catching sheen to it, and weaved through her shoulders.

"Only the munchlax, the buizel belongs to my friend," he replied. Laxer curiously looked at her as she looked back at him. She brought her hand down in between his ears and lightly rubbed back and forth. Laxer's face adopted an expression of comfort and he closed his eyes. Eren eyed the girl curiously as she caressed Laxer as if he were her own pokemon.

"You've raised him really well, he's in his best health thanks to you," she said.

"Thanks, but how did you determine something like his health just from that?" he queried, fascinated by the girl.

"I'm aiming to be nutritionist for both pokemon and people, so I've learned quite a few th-"

She stopped midsentence as she directed her attention from Laxer to Eren. She suddenly moved in close, _very_ close. Eren backed up on his seat, but the girl moved her face along with his, their noses almost touching. Her grey eyes seemed even more beautiful up close, and they darted around looking at his face. She backed up a little and cupped his cheeks in her hands and lightly gasped.

"You have beautiful blue eyes," she breathed. "And wow look at those amazing eyelashes!" Eren was admittedly a little startled by her actions and their proximity sent a shiver down his spine.

"U-uh thanks," he managed to blurt out, not quite sure what to make of the situation.

"Am I interrupting something here?" Terra's voice asked from across the table. Eren's head snapped to the side where Terra was standing with their orders in a tray, Aquater and Laxer stared at him too.

"No! I mean, I don't know this person," he clarified, hoping Terra would understand.

"Eren the player? I didn't expect that you know," she huffed. Eren shook his hand furiously in front of his face in denial.

"You've got it wrong, I didn't do anything," He tried to defend himself.

"Yeah don't worry, it's her fault anyway," a new voice said from behind the grey-eyed girl. Eren and Terra's jaws slacked and they pointed at the new person.

"You're Jake!" they exclaimed simultaneously. The top tier battle smiled at the recognition.

"I see you know me, I'd like to apologize on my friend's behalf here. She's a little eccentric, in nicer words," he said, pointing to the girl who backed up and pointed at Eren.

"But look at how amazing his eyes are and-" she stopped and this time jumped to Terra. "These eyelashes oh my god, you kids are so cute!" she squealed, while Terra looked a little terrified of the other girl.

"They're not kids Lily, they're freshmen, only two years younger than you. You might as well be calling yourself 'old' when you say that," Jake said. The third year was dressed in casual jeans and a striped t-shirt, combined with sneakers. Up closer he looked really mature and composed. He had sandy blond hair that was combed back, but tampered with his fingers or so. His t-shirt had a breast pocket where his glasses were kept.

Lily was dressed in a similar fashion, just that her jeans being ripped. Eren suddenly remembered that Calloway had mentioned the name Lily yesterday at the stadium, and had even mentioned that she was very pretty.

"Oh so you're Lily, it's nice to meet you. I heard about you from someone I met yesterday. You have really nice eyes too by the way." Eren said, smiling at the third year student.

Lily pulled on Eren's cheeks from both sides. "Aren't you just the sweetest, thank you so much! What's your name?"

"Eren. Oh and that's my friend Terra. Aquater is Terra's pokemon and Laxer is mine." He pointed at each respectively. "I really thought your battle was amazing yesterday Jake, too bad you lost, but it looked like you really enjoyed it."

"That guy is on a different level sometimes, it's a little frustrating sometimes honestly. But as you said, I always enjoy my battles with him." Jake stated.

"Zac isn't with you guys today?" Terra asked, setting down the tray in her hand and taking a seat in front of Eren. Lily shook her head.

"I told him to come with us, but Zac being Zac, he wanted to skip classes today and just stay in the dorm room the entire time."

Eren and Terra laughed at her exasperation. Jake scoffed, but had a smile on his face nonetheless.

"If someone ever asked you for a battle, would you accept?" Eren asked, his question directed to Jake.

"Honestly, I wouldn't most of the time, it's too much effort. If I'm really bored, I'd probably accept though. On the other hand, Zac battles nearly anyone who challenges him. God knows why." He sighed. "Were you about to ask me for a battle Eren?"

"Of course not, you'd wipe the floor with me as I am now. Maybe one day if I feel a bit more confident then I'll try asking," Eren said, positive that he didn't want to face an opponent that strong so early into the year.

"Whenever Eren asks for a battle, you have to accept, Jake," Lily instructed.

"And why is that?"

"Because he's cute and I said so."

Jake groaned. "What kind of a reason is that? And what are you, some freshmen predator or something? Lay off the poor guy."

"You don't have to accept or anything," Eren said, waving his hand. "It's your choice."

Jake shook his head. "You don't know Lily, if she's says something like that, she won't let you off the hook." Lily proudly nodded at the statement. "Of course."

Jake brought his phone out of his pocket as it started to ring. "Looks like we have to go Lily, it's Autumns," he said.

"Oh right, for that thing she mentioned. Sorry but we've gotta run. Bye Eren! Bye Terra! I hope I see you around," Lily exclaimed as she gathered her stuff.

"Ithinkyou'rereallycoolJake!" Terra blurted out suddenly. Despite her words being slightly incoherent, Jake understood what she had said and flashed her toothy smile.

He waved at them both. "It was nice to meet you, take care of your pokemon." He said as he walked towards the exit. Lily petted Laxer and Aquater one last time before following Jake out the door.

Terra sighed as they left. "Jake really is so cool. Who would've thought we'd meet them here. I wish Zac had been with them too, I wanted to congratulate him."

Eren grabbed his Triple Chocolate Cookies and Cream Sundae Plus Milkshake from the tray and handed Laxer his special ice cream. Terra just stared at Eren's choice.

"Are you sure you can finish that?" she asked, dubious and oblivious of his appetite. She had gotten a normal cup of ice cream with two scoops of strawberry.

"You're about to witness the insatiable hunger of Eren Fenrir," he stated as he dug into his treat. Terra slowly savored her ice cream, and watched as the trainer in front of her and his pokemon both wolfed down their desserts with a smile on her face.

"Calm down, you'll choke," she said, in between laughs. Eren looked up with a scowl on his face and the spoon still in his mouth.

"Jeej Tewwa, youb shound like Weyna and my mwom," he managed to say without the milk and ice cream dripping from his mouth. Terra burst into laughter along with Aquater.

"D-did you just say Weyna and mwom? Oh damn." Her laughter only intensified as he squinted at her.

"I wish I would've recorded that somehow, that was hilarious," she said, wiping a tear from the corner from the corner of her eye, her lips spread apart to form a grin.

Eren swallowed the big chunk of ice cream he had stuffed his mouth with. "If you had, I would've told you to be alert. I'm a pro at capturing embarrassing moments for your information."

"Ooh I'm scared," she said. Eren smirked.

"Maybe you will be if I eat your ice cream!" he exclaimed, reaching out with his spoon and a faux evil expression on his face. That seemed to do the trick. Terra's hands shot out to grab her cup Eren could touch. "Nope!" she yelled.

This time it was Eren's turn to laugh. "Oh you should have seen your face!" he howled, Aquater and Laxer laughing along with him. Both of them were clueless to the fact that the other people in the shop were staring at them, with expressions of both annoyance and amusement. The group of four were certainly enjoying their time.

Eren had completely forgotten the events that had happened earlier that day, but someone hadn't.

* * *

The tall man dug his phone out of the white coat he was wearing, a bilious expression coating his bony features. He quickly selected the desired contact and held the phone up to his ear, taking in a deep breath. He licked his lips as if trying to get rid of the bad taste of disappointing news in his mouth. A few rings later, the person answered the call. "Hello?"

"Yeah it's me. Experiment SC13 failed as well," he stated, his free hand curling into a fist.

"What happened?" came the question.

"Its mind couldn't handle it, it was it pain. It broke like some toy you turn with a key. And there was some kid who interfered as well, he was close to dying at SC13's hands but somehow came through."

The man gritted his teeth as his superior remained silent. He hated it when he couldn't live up to his superior's expectations, it was agonizing. He knew his superior wouldn't rebuke him, he never did, but it was a personal standard he had set for himself, and he didn't like it when it was broken.

"Send me a copy of the analytical details, till then you can standby."

"Yes sir." He threw the phone on the bed in frustration, flexing his fingers to hold his anger back. Next time would be different. Next time, he would succeed.

* * *

 **I apologize for the _very_ long wait for this chapter, I've been quite busy in the past few months and it prevented me from writing. I hope you all enjoyed the chapter and to those who have submitted characters who haven't appeared yet, I hope you bear with me as I need to plan out when each character should come in.**

 **Question of the chapter: What do you think will happen to Scyther?**


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

* * *

Eren rushed through the hallways, dodging people as he moved towards his first period class. Evolution and Progression was taught by a new professor going by the name of Marcella du Pallais, whom he had heard was lenient, but he didn't want to push his luck. Brock and the others had left quite a while back and he had accidently slept longer than he should have. He had told Brock not to wait for him, which proved to be a bad idea since he fell asleep soon after Brock had left for the cafeteria.

He had quickly showered, brushed his teeth and worn the first pair of clothes visible in his closet. The smell from the cafeteria was as tempting as it had been the day before, but he hadn't had the time to enjoy breakfast, instead grabbing a bagel and stuffing it in his mouth as he ran for the lecture hall.

He skidded to a stop at the door which said LH-1 and pushed it open, huffing and swallowing the last bits of the bagel. The students in the class snapped their heads to look at him, and he saw the familiar faces of Reyna and Terra amongst them. A student was standing at the bottom of the steps, impatiently tapping her feet next to the teacher's desk in the middle of the class.

Eren sighed in relief. Looks like the teacher hadn't come yet, lucky him. As he descended the steps to go sit next to Reyna, the girl next to the desk called out to him.

"It's not nice to ignore the teacher when she's in the room you know," she said, slight annoyance coating her voice. Eren looked around the class, not believing the short statured girl's words. He didn't see anyone that looked like a teacher at all.

"Uh, I don't see Miss Pallais anywhere, maybe you were seeing things?" he suggested as he shrugged. The girl only sighed, the blonde streaks in her bob-cut wavy black hair shining with contrast under the sun's rays coming through the window.

"I wouldn't think so, since you're talking to her right now," she remarked. Eren blinked a couple of times. He was talking to Marcella du Pallais? But that would mean…

"Wait so _you're_ Miss Pallais?" he asked incredulously, his mouth a small circle as he pointed at the girl. The students snickered at his quick realization.

"I'm so used to it that I don't even take offense in it anymore, but yes, _I'm_ Marcella du Pallais. Now if you would be so kind take a seat so that I can start the class," she said, gesturing to the seats.

"Uh, okay, sorry," he added as he sat down between Terra and Reyna, waving at Adelaide and Brock who were a few rows ahead of him. Reyna glanced over him with an unimpressed look.

"Your hair's all messed up, and you have crumbs around your lips," she said, putting her hand out to set is hair. He swatted her hand away lightly and brushed the crumbs off.

"I can do it myself you know," he indignantly said as he raked his hair to the side, the rebellious lock of hair falling over his eyebrow once again. Reyna and Terra smiled in amusement.

Marcella du Pallais clapped her hands to draw everyone's attention. "Now that we don't have any more interruptions let's begin now. First of all my name is Marcella du Pallais and I'm your teacher for Evolution and Progression this year. Since I'm younger than nearly all of you, at fifteen, you can just call me Marc or Miss Pallais, it's up to you. I'd like you to also remember that I'm your teacher in the classroom and a different person outside the classroom. So let's get started with the basics." She said, looking eager to start the lesson.

The first quarter of the class went on smoothly, surprisingly all the students seemed serious, even the ones who weren't listening didn't make any attempts to bother Marc as she taught. Eren was impressed by the way she taught everything so maturely and akin to a professional, especially since she was only fifteen. He had never met a child genius before, but had always been a little envious of the talents they were born with.

But he soon got a little bored of the topic at hand, he knew the basics, so it wouldn't make that much of a difference if he didn't listen initially. He took down the notes, but his mind drifted to the fun they had the day before. Even after lunch they had spent the entire day playing games back in the dorm rooms and talking about themselves. Terra had told them that she had lived with her fathers' close friend and his wife, both of whom were breeders. Her parents were busy people so they had dropped her off to live there.

Eren also remembered noticing the fact that Terra didn't talk much about her parents, on the other hand telling a lot of stories about the breeders who took care of her. Adelaide on the other hand had started her gym conquest at the young age of ten, and had even managed to get the first five gym badges before having to resort to bedrest and homestay due to her illness. Apparently she was famous in Kalos as a child star, which he found quite interesting in reality.

About halfway into the lecture, Marc decided to give them a small break. All the students happily complied, the room immediately filling with chattering voices. Eren leaned back and stretched his body.

"Anyone got food?" he asked, hoping someone would have at least something.

"I swear that's all that goes through your brain," Reyna said, giving him a disapproving look. Eren scoffed.

"There's hardly anything else just as interesting nowadays," he said with a shake of his head. "That and I barely had any breakfast."

"All your fault." Reyna said nonchalantly. "That's why you should wake up on time."

Eren waved her off. "Spare me the lecture Ivy, I had an eventful day and I was tired." Both Reyna and Terra looked at his arm. The bandage was still as it was, there was a little blood under it, but not enough to indicate that the wound had reopened.

"Can't really deny that," Terra murmured.

"Hey, you're Eren right?" a voice behind him asked. Eren turned his head to look at the person who had called him. Piercing yellow eyes inquisitively stared at him from the body of a lean and tall boy, who had forehead length short grey hair.

"Yeah, that's me," Eren replied. The boy was dressed in a black tank top, with some sort of Japanese characters placed in a white circle in the center. Eren watched quite a bit of anime from time to time and he understood a few words, but he had no idea how to read Japanese characters. The boy stared at him for a few more moments but then his lips broke into a grin.

"I heard you're the one that captured the rampant scyther from yesterday's survival course, cool man! Professor Hawkcrest told everyone yesterday after the hunt ended. No one could even manage to net the scyther in the dome, and you managed to get the even more dangerous one!"

Eren was suddenly reminded that he had to check up on the scyther once he had time. He really wanted to know what had happened to it.

"Oh I wasn't alone, Tanya helped me, in fact she was the one who threw the ball and captured it. I was just the bait really. We got kind of lucky I'd say," he said, squeezing his left arm a little.

The boy shrugged it off. "You'd need guts to be bait man, no one would be willing to do something like that." He held out his hand. "I'm Vic by the way."

Eren shook his hand. "Nice to meet you Vic, and thanks, I guess I just did what first came to my mind when I saw scyther." Before Vic could say anything again, Marc had resumed the class. Eren sighed and hung his head against the wooden desk, drowsiness seeping into his body. He was definitely not a morning bird.

* * *

"Ah, I think I'm finally alive!" Eren groaned in satisfaction, setting down the mug of steaming soup on the table with a loud smack. He felt his mind slowly clear up as the soup warmed his body.

"You're so noisy, shut up," Reyna murmured, as she looked up at him from her phone with her usual disapproving glance.

"You're so noisy, shut up," Eren mimicked, a smug grin on his face as Reyna glared at him. Oh the joys of annoying Reyna, worth it each and every time. The gang was sitting in the cafeteria again after Evolution and Progression, getting ready for the next class. Eren quickly rechecked his schedule to make sure he remembered what was next.

Pokemon Caretaking was just after the break, with Reyna and Terra. Despite the students applying for the same courses, the periods were jumbled, so Brock and Adelaide had different classes at the time.

Terra giggled at Eren antics. "So how long have you two known each other?" she asked. Eren glanced at Reyna and then scratched his head.

"Almost ten years I'd say, I met Reyna when I was seven. It was…the Viridian Forest I think." Eren replied with furrowed eyebrows. Reyna nodded in agreement.

"Viridian Forest? How'd you meet in a place like that?"

Reyna scoffed. "I remember it like it happened barely an hour ago. Eren thought I was a pokemon and he caught me in a net trap that he had set."

The others laughed and Eren shrugged. "I was a kid, what can I say," he said.

"Could you really not tell the difference?" Adelaide asked in between chuckles.

"She was wearing a weedle hat, can you blame me? The only thing I should've noticed was that weedles aren't that big." Eren said. This time the others laughed at Reyna.

"You wearing a weedle hat? That actually sounds so adorable!" Terra exclaimed with a grin on her face.

"And relatively unfortunate for her at the time," Eren piped in. "And because of that, she apparently hated me for nearly a year."

Brock looked back and forth between Reyna and Eren in surprise. "Really? I would've never guessed looking at you two now. Well that definitely changed, what happened?"

Eren scratched his cheek as he tried to recall what had changed. "Honestly, I don't remember. It's like I woke up one day and Reyna was friendly all of a sudden. I mean she's always annoyed of me anyway but it was like she despised me that entire year, and then that changed abruptly," he looked at Reyna inquisitively, "What exactly happened Reyna?"

Reyna seemed to shrink back a little as everyone's eyes fell on her. "W-well uh-" she started, but was interrupted by a student who had loudly entered the cafeteria, the doors clattering behind him. All eyes flew to the boy who was panting.

"Zac's having a battle with a freshman!" he shouted, pointing straight outside the cafeteria doors. At first, only silence greeted the boy, but then there was a loud uproar and without a moment's hesitation the students started to run outside to witness the battle. Adelaide was quick to grab her bag and she excitedly gestured to the others to come with her. Seeing that their break was almost over, everyone decided to follow Adelaide. Reyna sighed at the fact that she was interrupted, but for a second Eren could swear he saw relief on her face.

Adelaide sprinted off in eagerness, while Brock and Eren jogged slowly. Reyna and Terra walked calmly at the rear, their interest not as peaked as the others. A small crowd had gathered where the boy had indicated earlier. Eren squeezed through to get a front row view of the battle. He wondered what kind of a freshman would be stupid enough to challenge one of the top battle students in the school.

When he reached the front he saw two pokemon opposite to each other, but one was already on the ground while the other stood scratching its ears as if nothing had happened.

"What…happened?" Eren asked to no one in particular.

"That guy's pokemon got knocked out in one attack, that's what happened," the boy next to him answered. Calloway stood parallel to Eren with his skates slung over his shoulder, his backpack over the other. He grinned at Eren and mouthed a 'hey'.

Eren looked at Zac, who had a nonchalant expression over his face, as did his jolteon, who calmly walked back to its trainer's side. Eren looked at his opponent and was not surprised at all to find Derek standing there, an unpleasant look on his face. He walked over to his manectric Aiz, whose fur was crackling with electricity.

"And you know what's worse Eren?" Calloway said as his eyes followed Derek's movements to call Aiz back into his ball, "His manectric got knocked out by an electric attack, which isn't very effective against electric types at all. That's honestly some scary power that jolteon showed."

Eren was sure Derek was feeling humiliated to losing to such an attack in such a way. He watched as Derek silently walked up to Zac and held out his hand.

"Thanks for accepting my selfish challenge, I got to know just how much I still need to improve." He said with a straight face. Zac looked at his hand before reaching out to shake it.

"You're a little overconfident but you're not really weak, be sure to train hard." He said with a small smile. Derek nodded as he took in Zac's words. He turned around and stopped for a second when he saw Eren. In reply Eren just raised his eyebrows inquisitively. Choosing to ignore that, Derek walked through the crowd, who cleared a path as he passed through.

Soon after, the crowd dispersed, whispers of disappointment passing around. Eren turned to Calloway.

"So what's up? I don't see Lillianna around," he said, looking to Calloway's side.

"She got mad at me yesterday for some reason and then we got into a small spat," Calloway said, sounding a little regretful. "I'll tell her you said hi, maybe she'll listen to that at least."

"Eeeerennnnn," a sing-song voice beside him called, and he felt an arm fall around his shoulder. Not that she would be any different, but Lily was the same as she had been yesterday. She was dressed in light grey tattersall shirt and ripped jeans again.

"Hey Lily, I didn't realize you'd be here with Zac too. Morning," he said. Lily pinched his cheek and pulled. Eren winced but didn't complain, no use giving someone a reason to rip a cheek out.

"What's my favorite freshman doing this fine morning?" she asked as she pulled her arm back.

"On my way to Pokemon Caretaking since this battle ended fast." He said, looking around and seeing Brock rigidly staring at him, while Terra waved at Lily.

"Oh is that so? Weeell you're in for a surprise!" she teased, waggling her finger in front of his face, her grey eyes glittering impishly.

"I think I'm prepared for surprises after yesterday," Eren chuckled softly. Lily gave him a questioning look but didn't say anything.

"Oh that's right, I'll introduce you to my other friends. Here's Callloway, he's the one who told me about you the other day. Then there's Brock over there, Adelaide, my best friend Reyna and you already know Terra." He said, pointing to each of them as he recited their names.

Lily smiled brightly and waved at each of them. "Nice to meet you guys, I'm Lily!" she turned to Eren again, "I'd love to stay but I've got some place to be right now, see you soon!"

She waved at the others again before sprinting off along the road. Jake gestured a 'hey' as he caught Eren's eye. When Eren turned around, Calloway and Brock were literally up in his face, scowling at him.

"W-what's up?" he nervously said. Both of them squinted and looked him up and down. They placed a hand on either of his shoulders and pressed down.

"What kind of magic did you use?" they simultaneously asked, suspicious tones matching their suspicious features. Eren was laughing on the inside but he put up an innocent face. "What are you guys talking about?"

"You know what we're talking about." Brock said.

"Yeah, how does Lily know you? That's not important actually, why is she so close to you?" Calloway asked, his hand pressing down even more.

"Lay off the poor guy, Lily's the one who actually approached him in the café we went to yesterday," Terra said, bumping Eren's shoulder supportively. Eren nodded vigorously.

"Too bad you decided to go grocery shopping yesterday Brock, you missed the chance of acquainting with Lily. And thanks Calloway, I wouldn't have realized it was her if you hadn't mentioned her the other day," Eren said with a smirk on his face as he moved his eyebrows up and down teasingly.

Brock gave him a look of betrayal while Calloway seemed to regret his words from a day ago.

"Too bad for you, oh and we met Jake too and now he knows us too!" Terra exclaimed, a grin on her face, "He's soooo cool!"

This time Adelaide turned rigid as she looked at Terra with her mouth hung open. "Say what! I missed a chance too!" she whined. Everyone laughed as she continued to whine while trying to hit Terra, but not being able to land a single hit.

"Well you've exceeded my expectations Eren, maybe I'll tag along if you ever go anywhere, maybe I can get some new friends you know," he winked at Eren. "I'll see ya around then, I'll tell Lillianna you said hi."

He quickly slipped on his skates and dashed off, skillfully and swiftly navigating through the students. Eren looked at his back as it slowly disappeared. He had definitely forgotten to think about something, but what? Oh right, Calloway's hair had blinded him again.

* * *

Pokemon Caretaking was held in the Affinitive Academy Daycare and Nursery, just off to the left of the Pokemon Center. All newly hatched pokemon were kept in the Nursery for the first week, where they were taken care of, and it was made sure that they got the necessary initial nutrition before they could be given to their trainers. The Daycare and Nursery combined was probably just as big as the Habitat Dome, just that it was spread along a flatter base to accommodate the many pokemon.

As Eren waited alongside Reyna and Terra for their teacher to come, he saw Derek again, sitting on the grass and staring at it. Eren walked up to him and looked down.

"Why'd you challenge Zac?" He asked, "I'm sure you knew you stood no chance against any of is pokemon."

Derek looked up at him with an irritated look. "What's it to you?" he snapped.

Eren shrugged, knowing he had chafed a nerve on his fresh loss. "Nothing, I just wanted to know. Not that you would care, but I told you to wait didn't I? I told you we'll have a battle as soon as we're allowed to."

Derek pushed himself up and stood face to face with Eren, anger burning in his dark green eyes. "Well then you want to go at it now?" he growled. Eren stared back at him calmly. "Believe me, I would if we could. No use in going back to Autumns' office again."

Derek snorted at his reply. "Scared of that are we? You're like a damn goody two shoes. Fucking be a man," he said, his tone evidently sardonic. By now the other students who were waiting were casting glances at their verbal fight.

"You're trying to provoke me again, I already told you doesn't work on me. And just because you got your ass kicked by one attack doesn't mean you just go around getting angry at others," Eren brusquely shot back. Derek's words didn't affect Eren, but his uselessly aggressive and supercilious nature made Eren grit his teeth in annoyance.

"As if you'd be any different if you had challenged him, I doubt you could even land a hit like I did."

"He probably offered you the first attack anyway, a free hit for Derek, woohoo," Eren drawled, his gaze still locked onto Derek's.

Derek's balled fists were visibly tremulous of anger. "At least I don't ask for sympathy after getting my ass kicked by a random pokemon," he spat. Their surrounding had gone silent as the onlookers watched the altercation like a tennis match.

Eren was thankful that he didn't have an irascible nature like Derek, otherwise this would have escalated very quickly. But his annoyance levels were peaked, and he _really_ wanted to punch him across his face, he would definitely feel satisfied after that.

"I don't recall you being able to capture the normal scyther, so I think I did better helping my friend to capture an even stronger scyther, wouldn't you say so?"

Eren's perlocutionary tone seemed to end the verbal spat as Derek reached for his pokeball, ready to start a battle. Eren reached for his own pokeball, with no intention to actually throw it, but was stopped anyway by Reyna, who put her hand on his. She shook her head and beckoned him to stop. Eren immediately let the pokeball go. He glared at Derek before addressing him again.

"Also, you may have forgotten, but I haven't. Apologize to Reyna for what happened," he said, his voice low but firm. Derek hesitated as he looked between the two best friends, his jaw clenched as he kept his eyes indecisively on Reyna.

"I'm sorry about what happened, it was uncalled for," he finally mumbled after a few moments, before turning around and distancing himself from all the other students. Eren sighed and plopped down on the grass.

"If that went on any longer I might've smacked him, thanks Reyna."

Reyna smiled as she sat down beside him. "I know you well enough, so I decided to stop you there."

"Why even bother talking to him Eren?" Terra asked as she watched Derek stand in a corner.

"I didn't realize he'd be that big of a prick," Eren shrugged, "I want to kick his ass so bad, but the only way is a pokemon battle, so I'll have to wait."

Eren and Terra silently watched as Reyna brought her camera out and began taking pictures of the area while they waited for the teacher to show up. Eventually she did show up, and Eren was surprised to see that Nurse Thorne was their teacher. Guess he'd call her Professor Thorn from now on.

"Sorry I'm late, I was caught up with something at the Pokemon Center, oh hello Eren, how's the arm holding up?" she said, taking notice of him. Eren flashed her a thumbs up and she resumed the class.

"Right so I'm Professor Thorn and I'm your teacher for Pokemon Caretaking. I'm also head nurse at the Clinic as well as the Pokemon Center. I'm usually very busy with the Clinic and the Pokemon Center so we won't have as many classes as you'd think. But there will be a reliable substitute in my place who will help you. Now there's not much effort you need to put in to pass this course, but you will need a lot of dedication and patience. You will be interacting and taking care of the pokemon here in the Daycare as well as taking down a few notes once in a while because the final examinations for this course are divided into the practical as well as theory parts."

Half the class groaned at the mention of 'notes' and 'theory'. But in this case Eren didn't mind, anything that he was interested in doing never got boring. Thorn, after pausing for the groaning to stop, continued.

"Also you will need to log a collective time of fifty hours throughout the entire year in the Daycare taking care of the pokemon as one half of the assignment. The other half consists of taking care of eggs that we will give you. It's simple enough, but if any harm is done to the pokemon, you will be held responsible and consequences will be taken as per the dealt damage."

Eren absentmindedly nodded as she went on about the details. It was basically the same as it had been in the Ivy Daycare, and he had no qualms regarding the fifty hour compulsion, he'd spent countless hours helping Reyna and her parents anyway. The idea of getting an egg fascinated him, even though he had hatched Laxer from an egg Reyna's parents had gifted him on his birthday, he found the experience quite enjoyable and testing. Baby pokemon were cute and small, and in some cases really playful too.

"And so today, you're all just going to get a little acquainted with the daycare pokemon and the varied terrain we have here. It's very similar to the habitat dome actually, just that the pokemon here are either young or newly caught. Large pokemon aren't allowed here due to consideration of the available area we had when the campus was constructed." Thorn gestured to the fence which encompassed the small grass field they sat in, "Beyond this fence is where the terrains starts. And so since we're done with the basics, let me introduce my helper for this year."

Everyone looked back to the entrance to see Lily standing and waving at everyone. She walked up to the front and stood next to Thorn.

"Lily here is an aspiring nutritionist for both pokemon and humans. While Zac and Jake are considered the top battle students, Lily is the top student overall, with the best grades of all the third years."

Choruses of 'ooo's passed around and everyone applauded. Eren himself was pretty surprised at the fact. Appearances were really deceiving, somehow he was always reminded that in one way or another.

"Aw that's too much Professor, I'm only that good because I love what I do." Lily modestly said, though it was obvious she enjoyed the praise.

Reyna nudged Eren with her elbow. "Why does a top student as well as a beautiful girl like her associate with you?" she asked.

"After all these years spent with me, you still don't know just how spectacular I am?" he replied, wiping a nonexistent tear from the corner of his eye. "It pains my heart."

"I forget that's the reason that popular girl back in Viridian didn't want you to be her co-star in the play."

"Screw you."

Thorn cleared her throat as she gave them both a sharp look. "Lily will be helping the substitute in my absence so be nice to both of them. Feel free to explore and befriend the pokemon here today and if you have any questions, ask me."

She dismissed the students, who started wandering off past the fence to explore. Eren looked around, wondering if he would see another familiar face, someone like Tanya or Vic maybe, but there was no one else.

"So where do you want to go first?" he asked the other two. Reyna shrugged indifferently, but Terra spoke up. "I was actually thinking of splitting up, that way we could see more pokemon."

"Yeah alright, that works too," Eren said, picking up his backpack. "Well then let me know if you find anything interesting." Terra nodded and started off into the opposite direction, her ponytail flowing as she bounded through the grass and over the fence.

Eren whistled an upbeat tune as he jumped over the fence and started off in a random direction. Similar to the Habitat Dome, the Daycare was covered in a large glass dome, although it wasn't suffocating or congested in the least.

"So you're tagging along with me?" he asked without looking back, knowing that the soft clicks of the camera shutter belonged to Reyna. "You really can't stay away from me can you?"

Reyna ignored him, choosing to stop under a tree to see if there were any pokemon hanging on the branches. "Is your arm okay now?" she suddenly asked, catching him off guard. She walked up to his left side and held up his arm. She gingerly moved it around as she looked at the bandages, where a little bit of blood still outlined the cut. "Does it hurt?"

"It doesn't really hurt, but it stings from time to time. Thorn said it wasn't too deep so it'll heal fast." He said as he slowly pulled his arm out of her hands. "Don't sweat it, it won't kill me."

Reyna rolled her eyes. "I know that, dumbass," she swatted his other arm. "You're too stupid to die from something like that anyway."

"I see no relation between my stupidity and the cut, but I'll take that as a compliment."

They walked through the forest habitat without encountering a single pokemon, which was a little odd, Eren had expected it to be brimming with different kinds of pokemon. As they neared the end of the forest area, the grass and barks of the trees went from being dappled with frost to completely blanketed in a layer of it. The air was chilly and small flakes of snow were coming from the direction they were headed in.

Reyna rubbed her arms with her hands. "It's getting colder, is this the boreal habitat? I can't believe they actually have something like snow and ice under control right next to a forest habitat with a completely different temperature, that's some crazy technology," she breathed, looking over the new landscape in front of them.

What had been a forest barely a minute ago, was now akin to a tundra, the grass turned into barren land covered in snow. The trees were either pine trees or leafless trees with the branches glistening with thin layers of ice. Eren took in a deep breath, feeling the freshness of the cold air.

The Daycare had to be kept under the glass dome because similar to the Habitat Dome, it had controlled habitats for all types of pokemon. Maintaining the climates of each of the areas sounded like a tough job, but he had heard that trained laborers were stationed underground to make sure everything was properly functional.

"Oh look! Finally some pokemon!" Reyna said, pointing ahead to the snow coated rocks. Sure enough, there was a group of cubchoo tousling in the snow. Reyna immediately brought her camera to her face and started taking pictures of the cubchoos. Meanwhile Eren decided to get more up close and personal with the small pokemon. He slowly began to walk up to the cubchoos, making sure not to scare them. The must've noticed him approaching, because they stopped playing with each other and looked at him.

Eren stopped midway and waved at them, making himself look as friendly as possible. Probably out of curiosity of a new face, they slowly made their way to him one after the other. Eren crouched on the ground as he waited for them to come. Soon enough, they were clambering all over is legs and shoulders, one even sitting on his head.

"Hey don't run over my legs, it tickles! Hey!" Eren laughed as the small cubs squirmed around everywhere. He fell back into the snow as his legs gave way. He patted the head of the cubchoo on his head, making sure it's…snot didn't soil his hair.

"Sometimes you're so naturally photogenic it's annoying," Reyna said from behind him, her camera hanging around her neck. Eren shrugged as he held out a cubchoo for her to hold.

"Must be the pokemon, these guys are really cute, see?"

The cubchoo in his hand cheerfully cried out, as if asking Reyna to hold it, to which she complied. They stayed there playing with the small cubs. Eren felt as though he were back in Viridian, having fun in the Ivy Daycare.

The cubchoo suddenly stopped moving and turned their heads to the trees, making Eren and Reyna look as well. A large figure stood behind the trunk of the tree, peering at them. Eren wondered if this person had specifically decided to come to the boreal habitat, because he was dressed in a large white overcoat and large brown boots. For a second Eren wondered if this was the same man as the one whom he had seen after the scuffle with scyther the day before, but upon closer inspection he realized it was a student.

"You want to play with the pokemon?" Reyna called out, her voice slightly cracking from exposure to the cold air without suitable clothing. "Why don't you join us?"

The boy hesistated, maybe debating between running away or listening to Reyna. Eventually he made up his mind and started walking towards them, his long legs taking big strides through snow covered dirt. As he got closer Eren realized just how tall he was, his figure towered over the sitting figures of the two best friends.

Eren picked the cubchoo on his head up and held him out to the boy. "Here, they're really friendly."

The cubchoo snuggled up to the boy, taking in the warmth of the furry coat. It was hard to tell what the boy was feeling because there was a long blue scarf tied around his neck, covering his rest of his face below his prominent nose. He patted the cubchoo on his head and slowly rubbed his back. The cubchoo rocked its head back and forth, enjoying the touchiness.

"See, I told you they're friendly," Eren tickled one of the more playful cubs. "Why were you hiding behind the tree?"

The boy didn't reply, he just shifted his gaze continuously between the ground and Eren. Reyna knocked Eren on the head with her knuckles. "Don't be nosy, he has his reasons. I just think he's a little shy, right?"

The boy gave a slow nod to affirm Reyna's thoughts.

"What's your name? I'm Reyna, and this is my dumbass of a best friend Eren," she introduced, rapping her knuckles on Eren's head for emphasis. Eren swatted her hand away.

"I'm Tundric," the boy finally spoke up, his words at first barely discernable due to his thick accent. "I already know Eren," he carefully added. Reyna and Eren both quirked an eyebrow at that.

"You do? What kind of trouble did you create so soon?" she asked Eren, who glowered at her.

"I really like the way you're always so confident that I've always done something wrong," he bitingly replied. They looked at Tundric who was shaking his head, the bed-head styled platinum blond hair framing his face moving with his action.

"Eren is now vell known among the students of the survival course. Professor Hawkcrest was praising him yesterday," he said, his accented voice soft and muffled due to the scarf covering his mouth.

"Oh because of the scyther incident?"

Tundric nodded. "You are very brave Eren, I'm sure you'll be svamped by the students in the next class, everyone will be excited to see you."

Eren found it amusing how he tried to adjust his accent each time but it still managed to slip through here and there. "You make me sound like some of celebrity, it wasn't that big a deal." He said, though he was a little happy on the inside. He had made an unexpected nice first impression after all, ignoring the fact he went to Autumns' office on the first day of course.

"How about we move on to the other habitats now?" Reyna asked after checking the time on her phone, "We don't have too much time left till the end of class, let's look around as much as we can."

Eren nodded and stood up, setting the cubchoos on his legs down on the snow. He gestured at his back with his thumb. "You coming Tundric?" he asked.

Tundric eyes moved back and forth between Eren and Reyna before falling to the snowy terrain. "I think I'll pass." He murmured. Seeing as he was shy, Eren had expected that, not everyone was as easygoing and open as him.

"It's okay, see you around Tundric, it was nice meeting you," Reyna said. The blonde boy nodded as he looked at both of them again. "It vas nice meeting you too," he replied. Eren couldn't see due to the scarf covering his mouth, but he was sure that Tundric was smiling. They left him to play around with small pokemon as they moved to the next area.

* * *

The time had gone by pretty fast and class was already over and all the students were assembled back in the lobby of the daycare. With some parting words Thorn dismissed the class and students began to file out one by one. Just as he was about to leave, Thorn called him back.

"You guys go on ahead, I'll catch up soon," he told Terra and Reyna. Thorn was discussing something with Lily when she turned to Eren as he approached her.

"Ah, Jonathan was looking for you Eren, he's waiting for you at the Clinic. He said something about a scyther, but's that's all. Does this have something to do with your arm?" she asked.

"Kind of, yeah. Thanks for telling me, I'll be on my way. See ya Lily!" Eren waved as he jogged outside the door and headed towards the Clinic. It wasn't too far from where currently was and after a few minutes of sprinting he found himself standing in the cool atmosphere of the Clinic once again.

"Ah Eren my boy, good to see you!" Hawkcrest called out from his side. He walked up to Eren and patted his shoulders. "Nothing like a good run here right?"

Eren nodded as he observed the Survival 101 teacher. He was covered in dirt and leaves and large patches of sweat covered his muscle-fitted tee, though surprisingly he didn't smell at all. He put an arm around his shoulder and started walking him down the hall.

"Professor this is a clinic, you're not supposed to bring in dirt and bacteria here," the receptionist called out. Hawkcrest only gave her a friendly wave as he ignored her words.

"Now then Eren, sorry to have interrupted your daily classes but we have some news on scyther, and I thought that it should be shared with you since you were the one who requested that scyther should be properly treated." He said, his voice dropping to a more serious tone.

Hawkcrest guided him into one of the rooms and closed the door and shut the blinds. Eren saw that scyther was flat on a bed with an oxygen mask covering its face and an IV drip over its arm. Various other wires were placed over its vitals and connected to monitors placed right next to the bed. Eren was shocked to see that its eyes were open.

"Is scyther awake? It's not moving around at all." He asked Hawkcrest. "Well you see-"he started, but was interrupted by another voice from inside the room.

"It's in a vegetative state," a male voice said. Eren turned to see a man he hadn't noticed earlier standing right next to him. The tall man glanced down at him through his blue eyes, which were basically slits at the moment. His frame was wide and his sickly pale skin was only visible from his hands and face, as he was wearing a white shirt with a yellow tie hanging loosely from his neck. A pair of rectangular glasses hung from the breast pocket of his shirt.

"W-What?" Eren stuttered, forgetting what the man had said due his overwhelmingly odd presence. Hawkcrest gestured to the man.

"This is one of the brilliant younger teachers we have, Demi De Armand, he teaches Pokemon Habits and Behavior, which is one of the reasons I called him here. I thought he'd give us some insight on what happened to scyther."

"Uh, well nice to meet you Mr. De Armand, I'm Ere-"

"I couldn't care less for what your name is kid." Demi shot back. Eren gritted his teeth in annoyance at his tone. Hawkcrest laughed. "Don't worry Eren, this is just how he is, don't worry."

"Is that so?" Eren muttered through gritted teeth. Demi's eyes narrowed but he didn't say anything to Eren, instead he walked over to scyther's side. "As I was sayin' before," he pointed at scyther's face, "This thin' is in a vegetative state."

"And that means?" Eren asked. Demi looked at Eren as if he was the stupidest person alive. "That _means_ this scyther here is unable to feel, see or hear anything. It's in an unconscious state with its eyes open and the brain isn't functionin' properly, except for performin' vital functions to keep it alive. Damage to the brain is usually the cause."

"How long do you think it'll take for it to recover?" Hawkcrest asked. Demi only shrugged. "Bein' in a vegetative state first of all is rare in itself, and recovery usually doesn't occur, especially in the case of pokemon."

Eren's eyes widened as Demi spoke. So scyther wasn't going to recover? He wouldn't ever get to know what had happened to it? Eren was jolted out of his thoughts as Demi spoke again. "Recovery is next to impossible, but even if it somehow manages to recover, there's no sayin' what mental state it'll be in."

"That serious huh," Hawkcrest softly murmured. Eren glanced between the two teachers. "So there's nothing we can do about this?" he asked, his voice a little on edge. Hawkcrest looked at Demi for an answer.

"Nothin' at all. I'd say we put it out of its misery." Demi said. Eren blinked a couple of times as he tried to register what Demi had just said. "You mean…kill it?" he whispered.

Demi shrugged, a wide smile on his face, which was unnerving because the rest of his features were emotionless. It was an empty smile, a hollow smile. "In a way yeah, though it would be medically induced," he said, his tone nonchalant.

"How could you even say that! Who are you to decide whether scyther gets to live or not!" Eren blurted out, anger coursing through him. Hawkcrest looked at him in surprise at the sudden outburst but Demi wasn't fazed in the least.

"This is reality kid, this isn't somethin' you can comprehend with that brain of yours." He coolly replied. Eren shook his head. "Screw that! Even if there's only a bare minimum of a chance that scyther can recover, we'll take it!"

"Why do you care kid? This thin' nearly cut your arm off right?"

"Like I said, it wasn't itself back then! Someone did something to it and it was forced to listen. Whatever that person did was cruel and it made scyther like it is now, I'll make them pay for it once I find who they are!" he growled.

Both the teachers looked at the student in front of them, before looking at each other. Hawkcrest put a firm hand on Eren's shoulder and directed his words to Demi.

"I support Eren in this De Armand, you never know what will happen. We have enough amenities to take care of scyther, so let's leave it at this."

Demi sighed and ran a hand through his grey pompadour. "Fine, if ya say so." He grabbed his white coat from a chair in the corner and slung it around his shoulder. "Don't say I didn't warn ya if it passes away," he whispered in Eren's ear as he passed by and walked out the door.

Eren barely contained his anger as he balled his fists and glared as Demi's figure disappeared from his sight.

* * *

"Since today is the first battle class you all are having, I'll evaluate you based on one-on-one battles. You'll each be paired with another student and it will be a short battle, the first to defeat their opponent or make them surrender will be declared the winner," Autumns said as she held up a clipboard.

It was the day after Eren had been to the Clinic to see scyther and the first and only class of the day, Battle and Tactics. He was surprised to see the principal herself as the teacher, but she was only filling in for the original professor who was still on vacation.

Throughout the entirety of the day before, Eren's mind had only been on scyther and its condition. He had vowed to make whoever messed with scyther's mind pay, but he had no idea where he would start and what he would do.

"Alright so the first battle of the day is, well well, quite an interesting pair we have here, Eren Fenrir versus Derek Raymond!" Autumns announced. All eyes fell on either of the two boys who stood up from their seats.

"Good luck," Reyna whispered, while Brock flashed him a thumbs up. He smiled at the gesture and walked down from the seating area to the main battlefield. In addition to the large stadiums on the campus, the academy also had dedicated battle gymnasiums with proper battlefields. And there were quite a few of these gymnasiums spread over the campus.

Eren rolled his neck and shoulders and grabbed a pokeball from his belt. Across the field, Derek did the same, his eyes fixed on Eren. The tension between them was strong, Eren could feel it. Both of them had been waiting for this battle, and both of them planned to win.

Autumns looked between the two and raised her hand, "Ready? Let the battle commence!"

* * *

 **And so there you have chapter 5, I hope you enjoyed it! All new characters belong to their respective owners. I'm not sure when I'll upload the next chapter, as I'll be very busy in the coming few months. I hope you all stick around for the next chapters.**

 **Question of the chapter: Who do you think will win the battle?**


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

Eren gritted his teeth. Of all the seventeen possibilities, Derek just _had_ to have the one type that meant trouble for Laxer. He looked across the field to see Derek looking at him with a smug expression on his face, which only made his mood go sourer.

Derek had sent out Kuma, his makuhita, which stood opposite to Laxer poised to fight. Laxer on the hand was a bundle of joy just hopping about its spot, seemingly unbothered with the disadvantageous type matchup.

"We can do this Laxer, let's start with a screech!" Eren yelled. Laxer stopped jumping and inhaled deeply, its stomach slightly inflating. Moments later it opened its mouth and a bloodcurdling scream came forth, causing everyone in the gymnasium to cover their ears. Kuma took a step back, covering the sides of its head with a grimace.

"Stand strong Kuma, use belly drum!" Derek instructed as soon as Laxer stopped screaming.

"Hita!" Kuma shouted as it repeatedly hit its stomach with its arms. Soon, a faint but smooth red aura coated Kuma's body and it once again took a fighting pose. Eren licked his lips.

' _Not good now it's all powered up, but now it has half its total health. What should I do?'_ he thought as he skimmed through various scenarios in his mind.

"Alright Laxer let's try a rollout!"

Laxer leaned forward and somersaulted in place with a slight jump, the momentum causing it to slowly gain speed until it was a stationary blur. Eren knew Kuma was faster, after all, munchlaxes were very slow in general, but he had a hunch that Kuma wouldn't come forward to attack, not to mention rollout wasn't very effective against it in the first place.

Laxer having developed enough momentum, rushed forward to attack, rolling fiercely towards Kuma.

"Intercept it with arm thrust!" Derek called out. Kuma's hands began to glow white, and as soon as Laxer was upon it, it thrusted its arm out to meet the rollout attack. The two forces collided, kicking up a big dust cloud around the two pokemon. Eren squinted to see what had happened.

His eyes flew up, to where a body shot out of the dust cloud and hit the ground, skidding a few feet.

"You okay Laxer?!" Eren asked. The munchlax slowly got to its feet and shook its head clear of the dust. Laxer replied with a "Lax!" and turned its attention back to the slowly disappearing cloud, with Kuma standing as it had been when it attacked, its arms still out but no longer glowing.

Eren couldn't say that he hadn't expected that to happen, after the massive rise in Kuma's attack power as well as the super effective attack, he was glad to see Laxer still standing. The rollout had helped Laxer minimize the damage, but it wasn't enough. The battle seemed balanced statistically, with Kuma's attack high, but defense and health low. On the other hand Laxer had a good amount of stamina as well as better defenses. But the type disadvantage tipped the scales in Derek's favor.

There were two ways to get around this, luck or planning. Eren decided to go with luck.

"Okay Laxer, try for a metronome!" he called out, hoping that his luck would come in handy. Laxer complied by waggling its fingers back and forth, the tips starting to glow slightly. If Eren had seen a group of munchlax doing such an attack together he might have mistaken it for a satanic ritual of some sort.

Derek seemed a bit wary of Laxer and called out to Kuma, "Keep your guard up, you never know what could happen!" Kuma answered with a gruff "Hita!" and brought its arms in a guard similar to that of a boxer.

Meanwhile Laxer had completed its preparation and aimed it fingers at Kuma, as if having a gun in both of its hands. "Munchlaaax!" it yelled as the glowing intensified, Kuma's body tensing for an attack to come flying straight to it.

But it never came. Instead, Laxer's clones appeared in the form of a double team, surrounding Kuma completely. Kuma was shocked and it looked around, not sure how to proceed with the situation. Eren had hoped for a strong attacking move, but this was okay, in fact it was pretty great in itself.

"Great job Laxer! Let's follow up with another rollout!"

All the copies of Laxer became rotating blurs and rushed towards Kuma, kicking up sand all over the length of the field. Kuma looked from copy to copy, not able to distinguish the real from the copies.

"This is nothing Kuma, use close combat!" Derek called out confidently.

Eren watched in horror as the copies were decimated one by one in the blink of an eye as Kuma fiercely fought through the onslaught of rollouts with its bare fists. Despite the force of the rollout attack, the punches sent the copies flying and they disappeared, until only one munchlax was rushing towards Kuma.

"That's the real one Kuma, brace yourself!"

Kuma relaxed its body slightly and waited for Laxer to come to it. Eren pursed his lips. What else could he have up his sleeve? As Laxer approached even closer to Kuma, Derek issued another command.

"Alright use vital throw!"

"Hita!" Kuma yelled as it clamped its strong hands around Laxer, stopping the attack almost instantly. Eren and Laxer both watched with surprised expressions plastered on their faces, as Kuma roared and lifted the heavy little munchlax over its head. Laxer tried to squirm free but Kuma held on tightly. With another cry it threw Laxer to the ground harshly, slightly cracking the field around the two pokemon.

For a moment Eren wondered if Laxer was knocked out, but the munchlax slowly got to its feet, looking a little worse for the wear.

"Follow it up with an arm thrust Kuma!"

Kuma lashed out at Laxer with a glowing arm which sent it flying back, just a few feet from Eren. He wanted to go check up on Laxer but he couldn't unless Laxer was knocked out or until the battle ended. Kuma had used close combat which if Eren remembered correctly was a move it learned at a higher level. But that would mean for some reason Derek had decided not to evolve Kuma. An attack like that could mean real trouble if it was used again.

"You okay buddy? Talk to me," Eren called out. But Laxer showed no signs of movement and laid still on the ground. Eren hoped he hadn't miscalculated Kuma's belly drum powered super effective attacks, he knew Laxer had great defense, and even better stamina.

Autumns raised her hand. "Munchlax is unable to battle, the winner is"- but was interrupted as Laxer cried out. All eyes flew to the munchlax who was struggling to get up, its body bruised and covered in sand. It pumped its fist into the air and looked at Eren.

Autumns cleared her throat. "The battle continues."

"I knew you'd pull through buddy," he said with a smile. Laxer grinned back. Derek suddenly scoffed loudly.

"You should've just stayed down, this battle isn't going anywhere. You can't win this." He said. Eren just smiled at him.

"I'll be honest with you, I'm going to win this, and you can't prevent that," he stated strongly. Derek just shrugged, not convinced.

"We'll see about that."

Eren looked at Laxer again. "Trust me buddy, we got this, be ready to do _that_." Laxer nodded understandingly and stood with a determined look on its face, an aura of seriousness now emanating from the habitually jolly munchlax.

"Rollout again!"

"Lax!"

The munchlax started running towards Kuma, picking up speed slowly. At a point it jumped forward and somersaulted and started rolling towards Kuma, the strongest rollout so far.

Kuma steadied itself and was alert, ready to finish the battle. Derek waited for Laxer to get closer. Eren bit his lip, anticipating Derek's next move. Laxer was only a few feet away when Derek finally called out his attack.

"Use arm thrust and stop the rollout!"

Kuma obeyed by using its arm to clamp down on Laxer's side harshly. The powered up attack stopped the munchlax almost immediately.

"Finish it with close combat!"

Eren grinned, just what he had wanted, a loose guard.

"Quick use screech Laxer!" he yelled.

Laxer had already halfway prepared the attack and quickly let it loose. Another high pitched scream resonated throughout the gymnasium and once again people covered their ears tightly.

But this time Kuma's hands were occupied and it was too close to avoid the attack. As the screech hit it, Kuma stumbled back and a pained expression coated its face. Eren grinned, this was it, the winning moment.

"Let's finish this with a zen headbutt Laxer!" He yelled.

Derek watched with a astonished look on his face as Laxer's head slowly began to be enveloped in a blue light and moved forward to ram into Kuma.

"Dodge it Kuma!" Derek cried out, but it was pointless. Kuma was too close and not in a stable state to listen to trainers words.

Laxer rammed into Kuma's stomach and sent it flying past Derek and into the wall behind him. Derek looked back with his mouth hanging open slightly. A few moments passed but Kuma remained motionless.

After waiting a little more, Autumns raised her hand. "Makuhita is unable to battle, Munchlax is the winner. The victor is Eren Fenrir!"

The students applauded and there were a few whistles here and there. Eren walked over to Laxer and sat down to hug it, which was returned with even more vigour.

"Great job buddy, I knew you could do it," he said as he rubbed Laxer's head.

Laxer gave a fatigued smile and within seconds began snoring. Eren chuckled and returned Laxer back to his pokeball. He got up, only to see Derek standing right in front of him. Both of them stared at each other before Derek broke the silence.

"Why does it know a move like that? It's not a move munchlaxes learn on leveling up."

Eren was a little surprised that he asked something like that. "Laxer was a specially bred munchlax who I got as an egg on my birthday. One of his parents knew the move zen headbutt and was passed down to him. It allowed him to deal with his only weakness, so it was really amazing." He said.

"I underestimated your munchlax, it's a complete loss."

Eren shook his head. "You had me on the ropes, anything could've happened."

"It was a crappy battle for me, alright? I failed despite having an advantage, that's just crap," he growled.

"Quit being a salty bitch, just admit that I was better than you expected," Eren grinned.

Derek scowled. "In your damn dreams Fenrir, piss off." He said, as he turned around and walked back to the seating area.

Eren laughed to himself. He didn't understand this guy at all, at one time he acts like an edgy teen, the other time he seems humble and apologetic, and now even stubborn. It was pretty hilarious.

He walked back to the stands where Reyna and Brock greeted him with a smile and a clap on his back.

"That was pretty great Eren," Brock said. "I didn't know you could battle that well."

Eren grinned. "Thanks, the credit goes to Laxer though."

"Be sure to take him to the pokemon center later on," Reyna said. Eren agreed by nodding.

"Of course."

"I recorded the battle, in case you want to see it later."

"Oh thanks, are you planning to record every battle?"

Reyna twiddled her fingers. "I think I'll record all of them, but only keep the ones that really stand out."

"Sounds good to me." Eren redirected his attention to the field where Autumns was announcing the next pair. He felt a little giddy inside at winning his first battle where a lot of other students saw his skills.

* * *

Reyna moved her head slowly to the beat playing in Cream Works as she waited for Terra to grab their order. After Battle and Tactics she had split from Eren and Brock, who went for Pokemon History while she had Medicine and Health. Since their schedules were different she hadn't met them during lunchtime either.

Terra had no classes in the afternoon and had invited her to hang out in Southern Square, which she happily obliged to since she was free for the rest of the day too.

"Here's your order!" Terra said, setting down a tray. Reyna grabbed her Butterscotch Sundae while Terra took her plain cup of strawberry ice cream.

"Wow this is some good stuff," Reyna said, smacking her lips after a spoonful. "You really did your research on ice cream before coming didn't you?"

Terra grinned. "But of course. Good ice cream is a must."

"You sound like Eren when he talks about food in general."

"I have to say," Terra said, in between bites, "Eren has good taste, his Triple Chocolate Cookies and Cream Sundae plus Milkshake looked pretty damn tasty."

"That sounds like it could be dinner."

Terra laughed. "Yeah it was about three times the size of your sundae. So how was battle and tactics?"

"It was pretty good, the usual teacher was on vacation so Autumns decided to take the class. She paired up people for a single battle. It was Eren against Derek right off the bat."

"What, really?! What happened? Who won?" Terra asked, nearly choking on her ice cream.

"It was really close, but Eren won. It was pretty intense though."

Terra fell back in her chair with a sigh of relief. "I'm glad that prick didn't win, but I feel kinda bad for him, losing two battles already and even being sent to the principal's office."

Well he brought the first loss and the trip to the office on himself, so he deserved it I guess."

"Hmm," Terra trailed off with the spoon in her mouth.

The doors to the café opened and Adelaide walked in, looking as prim and proper as usual. She looked around before spotting the two girls and waving excitedly. She walked up to them and sat down, a glint around her neck catching Reyna's eye as she did.

"Hey guys!"

"Aren't you as excited as always," Terra said.

Adelaide nodded vigorously. "Today in appeal class we were told that the academy holds a contest every november, and the main attraction are the first years!"

Terra's eyes went wide. "Woah really? They didn't tell us that yet. That sounds so cool!"

"That's right! And annually the school also holds a contest where ALL the coordinators of the entire academy can participate. That means we can go up against the best of the school!"

"Wow that sounds like a blast," Reyna said, genuinely surprised that the academy would hold such a contest.

"I know right! So what about you guys, what happened with you all?" Adelaide asked, her green eyes moving between the other two girls.

"Nothing much, I had Evolution and Progression with Marc. She teaches really well, but so far it's the boring stuff that we all know already," Terra said, keeping her finished cup of ice cream back on the tray.

"Nothing much for me either, I was recording the battles that happened in class today. Oh and by the way Eren battled Derek and won," Reyna said, eyeing her half eaten sundae.

"Whaaaa I wanted to see that battle! And he won, that's great!"

"Well I recorded it anyway, want to see?"

Both Terra and Adelaide bobbed their heads up and down. Reyna fished for the case in her bag and removed the camera, turning it on and selecting the video. They all watched the battle and Reyna tried finishing her sundae.

After it was over Reyna put the camera back in her bag and the three of them got up to leave.

"I actually thought Laxer lost when he wasn't getting up, that was a little nerve wracking," Terra said.

Adelaide nodded at the statement. "Yeah exactly, and that zen headbutt was really well played, totally unexpected."

"Laxer was breeded by my parents and they gave him as an egg for Eren's birthday present. One of his parents knew that move, so it was passed down to Laxer," Reyna stated. Terra crossed her arms and nodded.

"There are so many things that can happen because of breeding, it's really interesting, right?"

"Exactly why I want to be a professional breeder. Taking care of pokemon all the time, that sounds great to me." Reyna said.

"Why didn't you choose the appeal course Reyna? You look so pretty, and I'm sure you could do well," Adelaide said with a frown on her face.

Reyna laughed nervously. "Um well, dressing up like coordinators do and then performing is really embarrassing. I don't think I could handle it."

"Aww," the other girls cooed.

"Well it can be kind of embarrassing admittedly, but it's so fun sometimes that I forget all about being embarrassed," Terra said, smiling.

"Well I _love_ dressing up and performing on a stage where everyone can see you and your talent," Adelaide exclaimed proudly.

Reyna laughed. "We already know that you love dressing up, it's so obvious."

"Hehe." Adelaide rubbed the tip of her nose with her finger.

"That necklace looks really pretty Adelaide, where'd you get it?" Reyna asked, eyeing the gold necklace which had caught her eye earlier.

Adelaide looked down and held the locket part in her hand. It was a small, all gold locket with a single horizontal bar through the front.

"Someone who I was travelling with for a while during my gym conquest in Kalos gave this to me just before we parted."

She looked at it with a different expression, but Reyna couldn't quite recognize what it was.

"Definitely from a guy," Terra said, looking over it.

"How'd you know?"

"Well a girl wouldn't give you something like that, only a guy would. Maybe it has some sort of message inside, or like older times, a photo."

"Either you're perceptive, or you watch too many movies." Adelaide said, smiling and letting the locket fall back to its original place.

"Perceptive obviously, wouldn't you say so?" Terra replied.

"Nah I chose movies," Adelaide said, sticking her tongue out.

The three of them shared a laugh as they continued walking in the Square. There was still a lot left to see, but Reyna had other business first.

"You guys wanna come to the bookstore? I need to buy some reference books," she asked the other two.

"I'll pass. I'm going to the market to buy some snacks to keep in our room," Terra said, pointing in the direction of the island's market area.

"I think I'll tag along, maybe I'll buy some fashions mags," Adelaide said.

"Alright we'll meet again at this spot after we're done." And with that, Terra walked off.

Reyna and Adelaide slowly made their way to the bookstore, which wasn't hard to miss with the huge book sign stuck at the top of the shop.

Reyna headed for the reference book section which was in a corner of the bookstore. Her teacher for Medicine and Health, Dr. Mercy, had told her students to buy certain books to help them understand complex concepts easier.

Reyna pushed a lock of hair behind her ear and leaned in to look closer at the titles. After finding the one she wanted she grabbed it and backed up, accidently hitting someone.

She whipped around to see a girl with a jacket full of very small holes and long blond hair in a ponytail.

"I'm sorry, I didn't see you there."

The girl shook her head. "It's ok, I know."

Adelaide rounded the corner to the aisle and waved.

"Hey Reyna, did you find what you were looking for?"

She walked up to them, and looked at the other girl with a mildly surprised expression.

"Oh hey Tanya, what are you doing here?"

The girl seemed a little shy, but spoke normally to Adelaide. "I wanted a book on dragons, like a detailed guide type book."

"Oh that sounds..very much like you actually," she turned to Reyna, "This is my roommate Tanya, she's in Eren's survival class."

Reyna was amused by how contradictory the two girls' fashion statements were, they looked to be literally the complete opposite of each other.

"Oh I know you Tanya. Thanks a lot for helping Eren the other day. It's thanks to you that he's not hurt anymore than his arm, really, thanks a lot," she said with a smile.

Tanya looked surprised at being thanked so much and waved her hands in front of her. "Please it's no big deal. It's basically my fault he even got cut in the first place."

"I'd rather blame his own recklessness."

Adelaide chuckled. "You're too hard on Eren, give him a break already."

"Maybe when he actually learns from mistakes. Anyways, you must really like dragon pokemon I assume?"

Tanya nodded vigorously. "They're the best type ever! Super strong and majestic! I love them!" She cried.

Reyna smiled at her enthusiasm. "It's true that they're majestic and strong, I remember helping my parents take care of a dragonair. It was really really beautiful."

Tanya's eyes glittered at the mention of the dragon.

"Whoa you actually got to take care of one? That's so cool! I still haven't evolved my dratini so I'm really excited for when it happens!"

"I'd really love to see it one day, maybe I could tell you how far it is from evolving."

"Wow you know how to notice stuff like that? That's really cool," Tanya said in awe.

"Alright alright we can talk after we get out of this store," Adelaide said, and she ushered the other two towards the counter, where Reyna paid for her book and Adelaide paid for her mag.

The three of them walked out of the bookstore only to see two guys ganging up on some girl, several feet from where they were standing.

The two boys looked a little older, probably second year students. The girl was taller than Reyna and had dark toffee colored skin. Her dark chocolate hair was pulled back in cornrows over her skull and the rest seemed to fall in curls, Reyna catching a glimpse of the lower parts blending from blonde to icy blue at the hips.

She was wearing a midnight blue sleeveless jacket whose hood was lined with fur, a pale blue tank top and dark jeans. It was hard to tell, but her build seemed quite athletic from afar.

One of the boys looked her up and down. "What the hell happened to you? Your skin's covered in scars you ugly bitch. Why don't you just go back to where you came from, ugly duckling."

The other boy sneered. "Forget the body, the hell is that on your neck? It looks nasty. You're definitely the ugliest girl I've seen, jeez go get surgery or something.

Reyna felt her blood boil at each word that came out of their mouths. Just how pathetic were they, saying stuff like that to a girl.

Reyna began to walk forward but Tanya reached out and grabbed her wrist. Reyna gave her a hard, questioning look.

"You don't need to bother," Tanya said, letting go of her arm. "She doesn't need help, just watch."

Reyna stayed where she was and looked back. The girl hadn't spoken a word yet her face still looking down at her feet.

The boys continued jeering but she didn't pay them heed. She looked up, and Reyna saw the boys visibly flinch under her intense glare. Her passive aggressive look made the boys take a step back.

"What's that look for, are you looking down on us? Piss off!" One of the boys shouted.

But the girl did far from that. She walked closer and angrily bared her teeth, glaring with pressing intensity.

The boys really looked intimidated now, taking a few more steps back.

"You're really a wild bitch, we'll let you off the hook for now. Don't show that face of yours around anymore, no one wants to see it!"

With that they ran off leaving the girl standing alone. A few people had been looking but nobody paid much attention to it.

Reyna walked up to the girl, ignoring Tanya's quiet hiss.

"Hey, you okay? Don't pay attention to guys like that," she said, reassuring the girl. Now that she was closer, Reyna noticed what the boys had been talking about.

The girl's skin was covered in multiple scars running all around her arms. She nearly gasped when she saw the scar on the girls neck, it was huge and covered her throat. But it looked painful instead of ugly.

The girl's jaw clenched, her curved cheekbones catching the sunlight and her smooth eyebrows furrowing.

"No no, I just thought it looks really painful, it must have hurt a lot," Reyna said emphatically. "Something like a scar won't make you ugly, it's what you are on the inside that matters."

The girls dark eyes observed Reyna, taking in her each and every word. The girl gave a curt nod and turned around, walking away from her.

Reyna just watched her leave, Adelaide and Tany walked up to either of her sides.

"That was a little rude don't you think?" Adelaide asked, her eyes on the back of the girl.

Tanya shook her. "A little for sure, but that's just how Kris is. She doesn't really talk to anyone, people say it's because the scar on her throat altered her voice and she doesn't want people to hear it."

"Oh that's kind of sad, I feel bad for her," Reyna murmured.

"A little yeah. But she doesn't try to communicate by any other way either, she's just cold in general to people. Honestly I'm a little wary of her."

"Why's that?" Adelaide questioned.

"She specializes in ice types."

Reyna stifled a laugh. "You sound like a dragon type yourself."

Tanya briskly nodded. "I am one with my pokemon, and we don't like ice."

"Well then miss dragon let's get going already, we'll spend the rest of the time at the dorms," Adelaide said, and they headed back to meet Terra at their designated spot.

* * *

Eren's feet hammered against the ground as he ran around the campus roads. It was nighttime, around ten, and he had decided to go out for a run.

Barely anybody was out that this time, choosing to stay in their rooms, but Eren wanted some fresh air. Sweat trickled down his body and the cool air brushed against his face and arms, making him feel even fresher.

Music blasted his ears through his headphones, keeping his energy high. Eren always listened to music that kept him blood pumping, it made him feel energized.

Since there was no curfew time, it made running at night better than early morning, where he would be sluggish and groggy.

He slowed down and came to a stop at an empty bench. With a huff he sunk into the bench, breathing heavily. He wiped his forehead with his already drenched shirt and checked his timer. About an hour had passed since he started his run.

He let out a long breath of air and closed his eyes, just focusing on breathing. The day had gone by pretty normally, after battle class he and Brock had shifted between other classes while the girls basically had zero classes, which seemed pretty unfair to him.

Pokemon History wasn't actually as bad as he had expected, in fact it was kinda fun to know about things that happened long before, but only if they involved more pokemon than people, otherwise it really _was_ boring.

Mythology and Legends was similar to Pokemon History, but much better. Their teacher made the class quite interesting and some stories just sounded really badass. And the library was humongous, he hadn't ever seen so many books in one place before.

The only bad thing so far was that most of the teachers had already started giving out assignments and homework, barely even a week into the year. It was really annoying to write so much stuff.

"Oh hey Latecomer, what are you doing here at this time?"

Eren turned to see Marcella Pallais standing beside the bench with two cans in her hand. She was dressed as she had been in the classroom, a white button shirt with a blue vest and a red tie.

"Hey teach, what are _you_ doing here at this time?" He answered back.

She sat down on the other side of the bench. "I asked first."

"Fair enough. I was out for a run, decided to stop to catch my breath. The fresh air at night is the best. Now you tell me teach."

"Call me Marc, I'm only your 'teach' in the classroom, Latecomer. And I like the fresh air at night too, it feels nice to walk."

"Call me Eren, I was only a Latecomer on the first day," he answered back cheekily.

Marc laughed, and extended a can towards him. "I got an extra, but it looks like you could use one."

"Sorry I don't drink aerated drinks."

"It's cold coffee."

"Oh then don't mind if I do."

He grabbed the cold can, popped the top and took a sip. It tasted nice and cool, with just the right mix of sweet and bitter.

"That hits the spot, thanks. I owe you a drink now."

"Don't sweat it. So how's school so far?" She asked, popping her can too. Eren took another sip from his.

"Better than I expected actually. But nothing exciting happened yet, it's the normal school stuff. So far Survival class has been the best, even though there's been only one lecture. What about you, how does it feel to teach students?"

Marc laughed nervously. "I'll say the same thing, better than I expected. At first it really was nerve wracking to teach when everyone is older than me. I thought nobody would listen at all and just make fun of me, but nothing like that happened. I mean I'm sure that some people don't like me, but maybe it's a form of respect that they don't say anything."

"Sorry but I nearly fell asleep in your first class. The topic was pretty boring," Eren said, grinning.

Marc lightly snorted. "You think I didn't notice? Well I can't blame you either, we have to start with the basics. But don't worry, I'll give you piles of homework soon enough."

Eren held his hands up in cross. "Nope. Please nope. Spare our souls."

"Well I'll see about that soon. Lately the teachers have been preparing for the first years' visit to Primis Island, so they're too busy. That's literal latin for 'first'. Apparently each year it's customary for the teachers to take the students to Primis."

Eren's eyes widened. "We'll get to visit the islands already! Hell yeah! When are we going?"

"Aren't you excited. Maybe a week or two from now, depends on how they divide all the students. They can't take all of them at once. Sadly I don't know the details of what happens there, because I'm being sent as a student too."

Eren felt as if all his energy had returned completely with just the mention of the islands.

"Finally, I've been wanting to explore the islands since I heard about them. Have you been to any of them yet?"

Marc shook her head. "Not even one, I've been a little busy so I haven't had the chance."

The sound of a shrill ringtone pierced the quiet night, and March reached for her pocket. She turned to Eren after seeing the name on the screen.

"Looks like I have some reporting to do." She got up and held out her hand. "Well I'll see you again Eren, don't be late for the next class, and don't sleep either," she added at the end with a smile.

Eren reached out and shook her hand. "That was a one time thing don't worry," he said, adding a wink.

He waited as she left, before getting up and putting his headphones back on and running back in the direction of Ignis dorm. He couldn't get rid of the smile plastered on his face, the excitement was too much. A week was way too far off, he wanted to go right then and there.

The run back to the dorm didn't take too long, since he hadn't strayed too far from that area. He walked into the lobby and shivered at the sudden air conditioning.

He removed his headphones and looked around, it was empty, no sign of Jenna either. A towel momentarily covered his eyes and he turned to see Reyna standing behind him dressed in her pajamas. Since it was moderately cold, she had opted for loose sweats and a t-shirt. Her hair was tied up in a small ponytail at the back and the locks in the front framed her face.

"Thanks," Eren said, wiping his face and neck free of sweat. "Brock said he was preparing some stew, is he done?"

Reyna nodded. "Yeah we were waiting for you to come, let's go."

Together they began climbing the stairs to Eren's room.

"Please tell me you're gonna take a bath before you sleep. You reek of sweat."

"Well yeah that's 'cause sweat doesn't smell like chocolate, or vanilla."

"I wish it did."

Eren gave her a weird look. "So you could keep smelling me? I didn't know you were that much of a pervert, ew."

"What! Of course not, that's disgusting!"

"It's okay, I understand that people are different and have different tastes, don't feel embarrassed."

"Please just shut up."

Eren snickered. "Yeah of course I'll take a bath, I'm very hygienic. Care to join me under the _steaming, hot_ water?" He whispered in her ear.

Reyna shuddered and backed off. "Ugh, hell no!"

Eren laughed. Teasing Reyna really was the best. "Well you just missed a great opportunity, but it's okay, someday you'll realize how mistaken you were to say no."

"That day will never come."

"We'll see." Eren pushed open the door after using his key, and was immediately bombarded by Aquater and Laxer. "Hey guys! You hungry?" He asked while scratching their chin and cheek respectively. Both the pokemon gave a cry of 'yes!' and ran towards the kitchen where Brock was handling a large pot and stirring its contents.

"Hi Eren! Yuck you're so sweaty!" Terra said, retracting the hand she was about slap his back with.

"So I've been told," he replied, glancing at Reyna who just glared at him. He bumped fists with Brock and exchanged a hi five with Adelaide.

"So is it ready yet Brocko?" He asked, his salivary glands hurting from the overwhelmingly succulent aroma.

"Almost, why don't you go shower while I serve it up?"

"Alright I'll be back in a minute."

He quickly rushed into the bathroom with his clothes and showered as fast as he could. He slipped a new pair of shorts and a tee and walked out with the towel hanging on his neck and his hair dried, but messy.

Brock had already served the stew and everyone had started eating. The two pokemon were given the food they liked as well, and they sat in a corner happily eating. The others sat on either of the beds so Eren grabbed his own serving and sat between the two beds.

"You'll never guess what I just found out." He said, eating a spoonful of the stew. "All the first years are going to be taken to Primis Island to explore!"

"Woah really!? Who told you?" Adelaide asked.

"I met Marc, our Evolution and Progression teacher while I was catching my breath. She told me most of the teachers were busy preparing for the trip."

"Alright! I've been waiting to explore the islands ever since we heard of them!" Terra exclaimed, and Eren nodded in agreement, pointing his spoon at her.

"I wonder what kind of pokemon live there?" Brock said.

"I wonder if we can catch those pokemon, that would be so cool," Reyna breathed.

"This is the first of many, I wanna explore every single island!" Eren yelled. Aquater and Laxer both shouted their agreement.

They all sat and ate, chattering about what could happen at the island, and what it had in store for them.

* * *

Eren stood on the docks with the gang amongst many of the other first years. A week and a half had passed since he had found out about the island trip from Marc. During the entirety of that time, he had been restless, feeling some relief when the final dates were mentioned.

The freshmen had all been divided into four groups, where one group would go to Primis on one day, the next group the next day and so on. Luckily the gang was in the same group and they were the second group.

Eren didn't know anyone from the first group , so he had no idea what was going to happen there, it was all a mystery.

"I'm so excited!" Terra squealed as she jumped around in her spot.

"So am I, this is going to be fun!" He said, hoping that it really would be.

"Alright now students quiet down!" A voice boomed. The murmuring and shouting of the students came to a halt and all eyes looked at Hawkcrest who stood in front of the crowd.

Beside him stood the tall teacher Eren had seen on the day of the exhibition battle, in the same shirt as that day too. Autumns stood a little towards the side, talking on the phone.

"The two of us, Prof. Hawkcrest and Prof. Ferro will be accompanying you to Primis Island. It's an island that many people visit. We always have a few people stationed at the base level, such as a doctor and a small clinic in general. The island is inhabited by quite a few species of pokemon and yes, you're allowed to catch them, but it's limited to one pokemon per person in order to keep it balanced."

Excited murmurs passed through the crowd before Hawkcrest addressed them again.

"You'll be grouped in squads of five, but they will be the randomized squads we have already decided, you may not choose your own or request a squad change."

Terra and Adelaide looked at each other with a frown on their faces.

"The squads will be dispatched as soon as you land on the island, and certain instructions will be given to you by the assistants we have stationed there. The general reason is to explore the island, but," Hawkcrest paused, and the students leaned in closer to hear. "But, Primis is an island of treasures and puzzles, it's very large, nearly half the size of quake island, so there's a lot to see. I say it's an island of treasures, but they're not easy to find, you'll have to work to find them."

"Holy shit we can find treasure?" Eren whispered, a smile of glee on his face. Hawcrest's words were making his adience flare, the only thing holding him back was the fact that he wasn't on the island yet.

"And there's puzzles and stuff like that too!" Terra whispered back.

Hawkcrest continued. "There's a limit of five hours and we'll be providing you with packed lunches, so that you're not in danger of hunger during your adventures!"

The students shared a laugh at his words.

"Alright now we'll start announcing the squads and we request the students to come forward when their name is announced." Prof. Ferro explained.

As the two teachers began calling out the names of students, Eren turned to the others.

"I doubt that all of us will end up in the same squad, so good luck during the exploration!"

He held out his hand, palm down. The others put their hands on top of his and they shot it up in the air with a 'Yeah!'

"If anyone's in trouble make sure to give the others a call, to see if they can help. Stay safe everyone." Brock added. Everyone nodded in agreement.

"And don't do anything unnecessarily reckless Eren," Reyna pointedly said. Eren pouted while the others expressed their approval of the statement.

"Depends on the situation really," he replied honestly, shrugging. How wrong could an exploration to an unknown island for the first time go?

* * *

 **And that's a wrap on the new chapter, it's a little smaller than the other chapters, but I'll make up for it. This fic had its first anniversary earlier this month *_*.**

 **I'm not sure whether to be happy that people still follow it, or disappointed in the fact that there have been only six chapters in a span of twelve months.**

 **But I would definitely like thank my fellow authors SomeoftheFame, Oly in Flight, The Awkward Trumpet, The Trainer Grimm and Shiny Eeveee for helping me out ever since we became friends, they were very helpful and encouraging.**

 **I apologize for the delay in chapters once again. I just got finished with my senior year in school so I got a little more time to write, but with college entrance tests coming up I'll try best to upload.**

 **Criticism is always welcome, I'd love to know what I'm doing wrong, in order to make the chapter even better ^_^.**

 **QotC** **: What do you think will happen at the island?**


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